


A Marriage of Misadventure

by noxlee



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Accidental Marriage, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Bottom Dean, Brief Mention of Suicide, Car Accidents, Destiel Harlequin Challenge, F/M, Gay Panic, Happy Ending, Hospitals, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Las Vegas, Light Angst, M/M, No Major Character Death, References to Depression, Top Castiel, injuries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-12
Updated: 2017-07-12
Packaged: 2018-12-01 01:39:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 26,863
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11475900
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noxlee/pseuds/noxlee
Summary: His first thought:"Who are you?"It's the morning after his brother’s spur of the moment bachelor party in Vegas and Dean Winchester wakes up with the mother of all hangovers. Even worse, he's in a stranger's penthouse having woken up with something else as well - a weird, dorky, oddly charming, dashingly handsome… husband!Up until now, marriage had always been off the table- Dean wasn’t relationship material, his life was in shambles, and he’d sworn off love for good. Then a night of terrible surprises, a few (okay, a lot) of martinis with Castle... no, Castiel Novak, and he's gone from first meet to marriage in one night.Dean wants a lawyer. But Castiel’s shocking bombshell?"I don't want a divorce."





	1. The Morning After

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the Destiel Harlequin Challenge. The prompt I received was very close to what's in the summary, with just names and small details changed. Thank you to the mods for such a fun challenge! It was a great first experience for me.
> 
> I am deeply indebted to [Shannon_Kind](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Shannon_Kind) for being such an incredible beta reader. In a very short amount of time, she helped fix my mistakes, pointed out my plot holes, and made so many great suggestions (including the basis for the epilogue) that turned this into a much better read than it would have been otherwise. She was both encouraging and constructive to me as a new writer. Thank you!! <3
> 
> A note on tags: I hope I have covered everything that may be potentially triggering. I am being overly cautious, but please know that this is not a dark fic, and there is a happy ending. It's a harlequin, after all. Feel free to contact me on [Tumblr](https://nox-lee.tumblr.com) if you're at all concerned about something in the tags and would like to know more before reading.

Dean’s first conscious thought was that everything was too bright. He squeezed his eyes shut tight, but a white light persisted on the inside of his eyelids. Although he wasn’t about to open his eyes to confirm, he was certain there was sunlight pouring in from a window somewhere. It was too bright, his head was throbbing, and every muscle in his body ached.

Dean rolled to block out the light and buried his face in the warm mound of blankets next to him. He inhaled an unfamiliar, but not unpleasant scent. It was deeply soothing, and Dean was pretty sure he could stay like this forever. Warm, dark, perfect. Nope, he would not be opening his eyes any time soon.

Then the mound of blankets moved.

Dean froze. Reluctantly he peeled one eye slowly open.

An arm emerged from the blankets beneath him, accompanied by a deep yawn. _Shit,_ Dean thought, as the arm fastened itself around Dean’s torso, holding him tight. He struggled in vain to remember the night before and what poor girl he must have wound up with. His trip to Vegas was off to a predictable start. _Damn it_ , _what was her name?_ He remained frozen, afraid to move and wake her further.

Dean squinted a little and saw that the arm was decidedly muscular. He followed it up to the edges of a broad, taut shoulder, still mostly covered under the blankets. Dean stared, stunned. The arm around him loosened and it was the low, deep groan that came next that had Dean springing back in panic. That was almost certainly a male sounding groan. Dean was in bed with another dude, and holy shit just how wasted did he get last night?!

Dean scrambled back a little too quickly and tumbled off the edge of the bed in shock. He landed hard on his ass and yelped at the sudden flash of pain that he tried very hard to ignore.

It was indeed a man’s head that peeked over the edge of the bed and down at Dean on the floor.

The man squinted at him sleepily and tilted his head to one side, considering. He stared for a long moment, before yawning. “Morning,” the man grumbled. His voice was low and gravelly and Dean felt a shiver go down his spine. The man looked around, prompting Dean to do the same.

The sun was in fact shining through a large window, glinting off a mirror. Dean blocked out the light with his hand and continued his survey of the room, which was large and swanky, but looked like it had been ransacked. There was a Renaissance style painting that appeared to have fallen off the wall and was resting crooked on the floor. There were clothes strewn everywhere. A tan coloured coat over a chair, black dress pants hanging on the edge of the mirror, a shoe halfway under the painting. Dean recognized his own jeans crumpled in a heap at the end of the bed and looked down startled to discover that he was entirely naked. He grabbed frantically for the sheets and pulled them down over himself, which only succeeded in pulling them off of his bedmate and further exposing the nakedness of the man peering down at him.

“Oh God.” Dean buried his face in his hands and heard the man chuckle. He snapped his head back up, glaring. The sudden movement made his head throb and the room spin.

“I’m not… I don’t know what… The fuck… look, I’m not gay,” Dean stammered.

The man looked around, taking in the rumpled sheets, the clothes strewn across the room, an empty condom wrapper, and finally down at his own naked form. He looked back down at Dean. “I think you might be a little gay.”

Dean started to shake his head in protest and groaned when the room started spinning again. When his vision came back into focus, the man was still staring at him intently, eyes squinting. His hair was dark and sticking up in all directions. He had dark stubble to match, framing pink, swollen lips that Dean found it hard to pull his gaze away from. As the man rubbed the sleep from his eyes and opened them more fully, Dean saw that they were a bright, piercing shade of the most stunning blue he had ever seen. God, he was fucked.

“What happened?” Dean groaned.

“Sex, most likely,” the man said.

“No, I—God. I mean, how did I get here? Who the hell are you?”

“I’m Castiel,” the man said. He cleared his throat. “Um. Pleasure to meet you….”

“Dean.”

“Hello Dean.” The man smiled at him warmly and extended a hand down to him. For a bewildering moment, Dean thought he was offering to shake his hand, but then his hand was gripped tightly and he was pulled to his feet.

“There’s a washroom down the hall and to your left if you’d like to, uh, freshen up.”

Yes, that sounded good. Anything to get the hell out of there. Dean collected what he could see of his clothing, keeping the sheet wrapped securely around his lower half, and made his way towards the doorway with as much dignity as he could muster, tripping only once over a bottle of lube that he resolutely ignored. Once outside the bedroom, he saw another door to his right and a large open kitchen and living area off the end of the hallway, but he made a beeline for the other door on the left.

Once safely inside the washroom, Dean fell to his knees at the toilet and began dry heaving, clinging to the toilet bowl with white knuckles. He stared at his hands and realized that his ring was missing. _Fucking perfect,_ he thought. The ring had been his mother’s before she died and he’d gone and lost it in the throes of a one-night stand he was too hungover to even remember. The shame that had been roiling low in his gut only intensified, and he took a deep breath so as not to start retching again.

He sat back on the tile floor and looked around. The washroom was huge. There was a deep soaker tub, a large marble vanity, and a walk-in shower. His ass was warm and he realized with a start that the floor was heated. He let out a low whistle of appreciation.

Dean stepped into the shower and turned the water as hot as he could stand it. He accidentally leaned against a button of some sort and massage jets lining the inside of the shower sprang to life, making him groan as the warm water worked its way into his muscles. A soft mist fell from the overhead jets, giving the whole thing the illusion of a tropical waterfall if he just closed his eyes. He thought briefly of the small, rusty shower at home that never got hot enough. He could get used to this.

As the fog from his mind began to clear, Dean took stock of his current predicament. First, his impala had broken down just outside of Vegas when he’d hit a pothole and he’d had to take her straight to a garage for a replacement part. Looking back, he probably should have seen it for the bad omen it was. He had come to Vegas to meet his younger brother Sam, who was on break from Stanford. He vaguely remembered a fight of some sort, though he couldn’t recall why he had been angry. And now he’d lost his mother’s ring, one of the few things Dean truly treasured, and had woken up next to a complete stranger.

He tried to remember why he’d been fighting with Sam, but his thoughts kept returning to blue eyes and tousled hair and full lips and...

Dean quickly turned the water to cold.

 

* * *

 

When Dean returned to the bedroom, his hookup had stripped the sheets from the bed and tidied up. He was sitting on the end of the bed, mercifully clothed now, scrolling through his phone.

The man glanced up at him as he entered. “You give pretty incredible head for someone who isn’t gay.”

Dean choked. “I—what?!”

“I was just going through my phone trying to figure out what happened last night and there are, um, photos. And videos.” He held his phone up for Dean and hit play. Dean heard the sound of his own low moans coming through the speakers and he froze. Peering closer at the video, he saw himself on his knees. The video was shot from above, looking down on him. The Dean in the video had his mouth firmly wrapped around a sizable cock, head bobbing slowly up and down, eyelids fluttering. He pulled off with a soft pop, a low moan, and started licking around the head.

“Holy shit. Delete that!”

“Why? You’re very beautiful.”

“Shut up,” Dean sighed. “Castle? No, um, Castille? Look, I’m just gonna call you Cas, okay?”

Cas shrugged and Dean continued.

“Cas, I’m not gay.” Dean spoke slowly, and carefully, so there could be no confusion. “I’ll just get my things and I’ll be on my way. Now, I was wearing a silver ring. Have you seen it anywhere?” He held up his hand to show his bare finger. “It’s a family heirloom, and really important to me. So, if you could just help me search around for it...”

Dean had started crawling on the floor and was peering under the bed when Cas cleared his throat. “Yeah, um… about that,” he said.

Dean sat up and Cas held out his left hand. On it was Dean’s ring. His mother’s ring. On the left hand of the guy he woke up in bed with.

Cas held up his phone in the other hand and Dean saw a picture of a wedding chapel. Cas flicked through a few more photos. A minister. The inside of a chapel. A blurry selfie of Dean and Cas kissing and Dean holding a sign that—he squinted, then went bug-eyed. It read _just married_ in frolicking, fancy script.

Dean stared, speechless.

Cas’s lip twitched, his eyes sparkling with amusement. “I think we got married last night, Dean.”


	2. Breakfast for Two

_Married?!_

The room started spinning again and Dean sat down heavily on the edge of the bed. He couldn’t be married, that just wasn’t possible. Dean Winchester was _not_ the marrying type. Hookups? Casual sex? These were the sort of relationships Dean knew how to do well. But the thought of settling down with one person forever filled him with a icy dread. No, Dean had sworn off love for good, hardened his heart, and knew with certainty that the apple pie life was not for him. He couldn’t be married.

More importantly, he reminded himself, he couldn’t be married to a guy.

There was a wheezing noise that took Dean a few moments to realize was the sound of his own lungs struggling to get air. He was hot. Too hot. He pulled at his shirt, and the room blurred more, darkening at the edges. He heard a deep voice somewhere far in the distance.

Then there were firm hands on his shoulders, briefly, and then bright blue eyes full of concern swarming his vision. He watched the stranger’s lips moving. They were a little chapped, and very close.

“Dean? Dean, look at me.”

Dean blinked rapidly, gasping for air.

“Dean. Breathe with me. In... out. In… out.”

Dean coughed, and did as the voice said. He breathed. In and out, and within moments, his vision had cleared and his breathing became easier. He gulped in a deep breath of air.

“Dean, may I touch you?” the voice was asking.

He nodded without thinking, and then there was a hand rubbing soothing circles into his upper back. The other hand rested on his shoulder, a firm, warm weight that grounded him.

“Do you have asthma?”

Dean shook his head no.

“Then I think you had a small panic attack.” Cas looked down at him, his eyes full of concern. Then his lips suddenly quirked into a small smile. “I’m not that bad, you know.”

Dean laughed bitterly, and let out a long sigh. Cas was now stroking his hair, and holding a hand against his forehead to feel his temperature. Dean swatted him aside, grunted, and made to stand up.

“Easy, Dean.” Cas steadied him until Dean could get his feet under him and stand without swaying.

“Maybe it’s not what it looks like,” Dean mused. “Maybe we just…”

“Just what?” Cas asked. “Strolled into a wedding chapel as complete strangers and posed for wedding photos?”

“Shit. Okay, we need a lawyer. My brother’s in pre-law. If we did get married, he might be able to help us get a divorce. Or an annulment. You can do that if you don’t consummate the marriage, right?”

Cas considered this. “I really don’t think that applies in our case, Dean.”

Dean could feel himself blushing. “Well fine, then we can say we were drunk. They can annul it if we weren’t in our right minds, surely.”

“Hmm.”

“Hmm?! What’s that supposed to mean? You don’t think they can?”

“I don’t know,” Cas scowled. “I can’t say I’ve ever been in the position of having to annul a drunken marriage before.” His tone wasn’t overly harsh, but Dean flinched all the same. Cas took a deep breath and his face relaxed. He gave Dean an apologetic sort of smile that Dean found a bit bewildering. “Your brother. You said he can help us?”

“Sam, yeah. He’s here in Vegas with me, actually. I should call him. He might be able to fill in some blanks from last night and he’s probably wondering where the hell I am.” Dean trailed off, trying again to recall what had happened with his brother last night and why they had fought. “Have you seen my phone?” It hadn’t been in his back pocket where he normally kept it.

“No. I can call it though. What’s your number?”

Dean recited it to him. As Cas entered the numbers, he chuckled to himself. “Dean Winchester,” he said slowly, typing the name. “Relationship: Husband. I’m totally putting you down as my emergency contact, hubby.” He winked at Dean who rolled his eyes.

The sound of Zeppelin echoed from down the hall and they wandered out into the living area.

Dean was halfway into the living room when he was startled by a loud squawking noise that rose above the sound of his ringtone. He whirled around to see a large, elegant birdcage in one corner of the room and in it, a very proud looking bird that was ruffling its wings ostentatiously, making a sort of clicking noise. It was mostly grey with a tuft of red in it’s tail feathers.  

“Balthazar, shush,” said Cas without turning around.

“Balthazar?” asked Dean. “Really?”

“It suits him. He’s an eccentric sort of parrot.”

Dean couldn’t argue that. The bird ruffled his feathers and gave him an indignant look. Dean frowned. He made a face and stuck his tongue out at the bird when Cas’s back was turned, and was startled when the bird snapped its beak at him and hissed in response.

Backing hastily away from the bird, Dean surveyed the rest of the room. Cas’s apartment was huge; larger than Dean had first realized. It was more of a penthouse, really. One whole wall of the living area was lined with floor to ceiling windows that offered a stunning view of the Vegas skyline. A sliding door on one end led to what looked like a wraparound balcony. The rest of the living room was lined with floor to ceiling bookcases, housing a variety of thick books and expensive looking artifacts. A massive TV hung on one wall, facing a dark couch and matching chairs.

Dean’s jaw dropped. “Holy shit, Cas.”

Cas flushed pink, and gestured in the direction of Dean’s ringtone. “It sounds like it’s coming from over here,” he muttered.

They found the phone under the sofa, next to one of Dean’s shoes and a lamp that had been knocked off the end table and shattered on the floor. The bulb was broken and Cas carefully picked up the broken glass while Dean righted the lamp and straightened up with his phone.

Several missed calls and a slew of texts. One was from the garage where his car was being kept, and the rest were all from Sam. He scrolled through his text history with his brother and the grim reality of the previous night came flooding back to him in pieces.

Dean slumped down into the nearest chair. This was bad.

“Dean?” Cas asked. “Everything okay?”

“I remember.” Dean said glumly.

“The wedding?” Cas asked, perking up.

“No. I remember why I started drinking last night in the first place.”

 

* * *

 

Dean remembered now. Sam had wanted to meet him in Vegas; this much he knew. Dean had driven all the way from Kansas, excited to see his little brother who has been studying pre-law at Stanford. But he had been surprised when he got there to see that Sam had not come alone.

He was with his girlfriend Eileen; a sweet girl with big doe eyes to match Sam’s own. Dean had bristled a bit at this unexpected intrusion into what he thought was going to be a guys’ weekend. It had been so much worse than that. Sam was getting _married_ to the doe-eyed girl. The impromptu bachelor party was that night and the wedding was happening the next day.

Fuck, that would be _today_ , Dean realized in growing horror. He looked quickly down at his phone. 11:32 am. Sam was getting married a little less than five hours from now. And Dean had either missed the bachelor party entirely or been there but gotten so smashed that he wound up in bed and married to another guy. Either way, it wasn’t good.

At least he hadn’t missed the wedding. He could still make it tonight. That is, if Sam still wanted him there. Chances were good that Sam wanted nothing to do with him right now. He debated calling Sam right then and there, but decided against it. If Sam really was mad, it was historically better to give Sam some space. In the meantime, Dean would try to figure out what had happened the night before, so he knew exactly what he needed to apologize for.  

He had been royally pissed last night, he remembered. And who could blame him? What kind of overgrown, floppy haired moose of a brother drops that sort of bomb and expects you to just be okay with it?

Dean relayed all this to Cas, the words spilling out of him in a rush as his memory returned.

“He lured me here,” Dean grumbled. “He lured me here for a goddamn wedding. And hell, isn’t he supposed to ask my permission first or something? Shouldn’t he have told me before now? How did he expect I’d react to that?!”

Cas had stared at him in rapt attention the entire time as Dean had become increasingly agitated. He continued staring now, blue eyes boring into Dean’s. Dean had to look away.

“I’m a little foggy on the rest,” Dean admitted. Judging from Sam’s texts, he hadn’t handled it well. What Dean was still struggling to remember was how he’d managed to wind up married and in bed with a total stranger when Sam was the one who was supposed to be tying the knot.

Cas still hadn’t said anything, just continued to stare. It was unsettling. But after a few moments, Cas straightened and said, “How about breakfast?”

Dean looked up at him and raised his eyebrows.

“There’s a diner down the street. We can… figure things out.”

“I’m not hungry.” Dean mumbled. Unfortunately, his stomach chose that precise moment to grumble loudly.

Cas smirked. “Sure you’re not. Come on, let’s go.”

 

* * *

 

True to Cas’s word, the diner was only a short walk down the street. Dean’s stomach continued to grumble as they entered and were hit with the smell of bacon frying. It was a little classier than the diners he was accustomed to back in Kansas, but bacon was bacon.

On the way there, Dean learned that Cas actually lived in Vegas and the gigantic penthouse was his. Dean had to hand it to himself, if he was going to get smashed and wake up married to another man, at least he had the good sense to pick a rich, handsome one. Well, he was attractive for a man, at least. Dean shook his head to clear it.

A cute brunette waitress greeted them and showed them to a booth. Out of deference to whatever the hell it was he had with Cas at the moment, Dean did his best not to check her out.

“Coffee to start, boys?” She asked, as she laid menus in front of them.

“God, yes,” Dean groaned. He scanned the menu, did a double take of the prices, and resolved to stick with just coffee. His wallet had been empty of any cash when he found it that morning, and he was certain there wasn’t much more than a few dollars in his account at the moment. He would just drink his coffee, sort this marriage shit out, and be on his way.

“I recommend the Sunrise Special,” Cas said, interrupting his thoughts with a wink.

“I’m fine with just coffee for now,” Dean mumbled.

Cas frowned. “But you’re hungry.”

“Nah, not really.” Dean shifted uncomfortably.

Cas’s face relaxed as understanding dawned on him and Dean reddened.

“Please, Dean. It’s on me.”

“I’m not hungry! I don’t need your—"

“I won’t take no for an answer,” Cas interrupted. “If you don’t order something, I’ll order for you.” He skimmed the menu and smirked. “And I’ll be ordering you the healthwise egg-white spinach omelette.”

Dean wrinkled his nose and Cas laughed. “That’s what I thought.”

The waitress returned with their coffees and Cas placed their order. Dean reluctantly agreed to the Sunrise Special as well, and privately looked forward to it as his stomach continued to grumble. He stared as Cas measured a careful spoonful of honey and stirred it gently into his mug. He raised his eyebrows in question.

Cas shrugged. “I love honey. It goes well with everything, and it’s a natural sweetener.”

Dean snorted into his own coffee. As he looked down, his eye caught on the flash of silver in Cas’s hand. He was still wearing the ring. Cas followed Dean’s gaze and jolted in surprise.

“Oh, um… here.” He pulled it off quickly, sliding it across the table to Dean.

They both stared down at it a moment before Dean scooped it up. It didn’t feel quite right to put it back on his own finger just then, so he tucked it into his pocket.

“So. What’s the plan?” Cas prompted. “What do we do next?”

“I guess I’ll have to call Sam at some point,” Dean said. He looked at his phone, wondering again if he should just man up and call him. But the last text from Sam had contained the sort of language reserved for when he was truly pissed off, so Dean was wary.

“Why were you so upset that he was getting married?” Cas asked.

Dean had been asking himself the same question. “I don’t know. It’s just— after our mom died, it was just me and him. I guess I thought there’d be more time before we were at this point.”

Cas looked at him, eyebrows raised in question. “When did your mother pass?”

Dean sighed, fingering the ring in his pocket. He hated telling this story. Truth be told, he didn’t tell it to many people. But something about the earnest look in Cas’s eyes made Dean relax; and besides, it wasn’t like he was ever going to see Cas again after today. Still, it wasn’t a conversation he was particularly keen to prolong.

“I was just a kid,” Dean said. “Sammy was a baby. There was a house fire and she didn’t get out in time.” He spoke quickly, and didn’t add that even though decades had passed, there were still nights when he would wake up in a cold sweat, certain that he could still smell the smoke and hear his father’s anguished cries echoing in the night.

Cas gave him a curious look and cocked his head to one side. “What about your father?” he asked.

“Oh, he’s still around. Not much to tell there. Mom died a long time ago, but he’s never been the same.” John Winchester had fallen to pieces when Mary died, and never quite managed to put himself back together again. Not for lack of trying on Dean’s part though. Dean stared resolutely out the window as he spoke, so Cas wouldn’t see his face. Then he carefully schooled his features and turned back to face him, bracing himself for the inevitable look of pity that he always got.

But the look Cas gave him was not one of pity. It was something else entirely; an odd sort of look that Dean couldn’t quite put his finger on. Almost a look of… recognition? It was not at all what Dean had been expecting, and he had to wonder: was Cas harboring some sort of dark and tragic past of his own?

He was about to ask him about it, when Cas spoke again.

“I’m sorry that happened to you, Dean.” His voice was lower and more gruff than it had been a moment earlier, but still gentle.

Dean breathed out. “It’s fine, we managed. I took care of Sammy. I always have. I got a bunch of part-time jobs to keep us afloat when Dad couldn’t manage or was off on a bender. Dropped out of school when it got bad, but I wasn’t much good at school anyway. Sammy was always the smart one. I was so proud of him when he got into Stanford, but it kind of tore me apart at the same time, you know? He left and….”

“And you’ve been waiting for him to come back home,” Cas finished.

Dean shrugged. “Yeah, I mean, I guess. Sam and my dad have never really seen eye to eye. I know he wanted out of there, bad. But I’ve been keeping things going, you know? Keeping us afloat for when he came back.”

Cas frowned a little and looked about to say something when the waitress returned with their food. Dean smiled at her in what he hoped was a friendly but not overly flirty smile.

Evidently turning down the dial on the patented Winchester charm was working, because the waitress didn’t spare Dean a second glance. She was all eyes for Cas, fawning all over him. “Can I get you anything else, handsome?”

Dean bristled.

Cas, for his part, was oblivious, and he dismissed her, only sparing her a polite shake of the head.

Dean watched the waitress walk away, hips swinging. He poked at the elaborate fruit garnish on the side of his plate. Ridiculous. No self-respecting man wanted his strawberries cut into flowers. No self-respecting man wanted fruit anywhere on a breakfast plate, for that matter. Cas, however, looked quite taken with the arrangement on his own place and started poking at it happily.

“So uh..” Dean started, unsure of how exactly how to proceed with this. He decided that quick and direct was the best approach.  “Are you gay?” he whispered.

“Yes,” Cas said with no hesitation, not even looking up from his plate as he began cutting his kiwi neatly into small pieces alongside his eggs.

Dean stared at Cas in amazement, taking in the impossibly calm demeanor of the man. So far this morning, nothing had fazed him. He just sat there, serenely eating his eggs, like this was a perfectly ordinary occurrence for him to be answering questions about his sexuality over breakfast with the total stranger he accidentally married.

Cas looked up and frowned at Dean’s untouched plate. “What, does it surprise you that I’m gay? We did wake up in bed together.”

“But I’m not gay,” Dean protested.

“Right.” Cas rolled his eyes.

“I’m not!”

“Okay!” Cas held up his hands in surrender. “Whatever you say.” He smiled to himself all the same.

Dean stabbed at his sausage and they ate in silence for a few moments.

“Hey,” Dean said, suddenly perking up. “I know why I got hammered last night. What about you? What do _you_ remember?”

Cas poked at his eggs with a little less enthusiasm.

“I actually had an encounter with my brother as well. Michael. He called and we had some… harsh words.”

Dean waited expectantly for more, but Cas changed focus quickly.

“I don’t often drink, but last night was extenuating circumstances for me and I needed to let off some steam. I do remember you. I was at the bar, and I was watching you argue, I think, with another man. Taller than you, longer hair. And a short woman he was with.”

“That’d be Sam and Eileen,” Dean said.

“Yes, most likely. I remember you because I hadn’t been able to stop staring at you all night,” Cas’s face was red.  “I kept telling myself, one more drink and I’d work up the courage to go talk to you. But one drink turned into several, and I had myself convinced I didn’t stand a chance with you.”

Cas smiled shyly. “So imagine my surprise when I woke up next to you this morning.”

Dean flushed. “No idea how we got there, huh?”

“Sort of,” Cas continued. “I remember you started shouting, and then you came over to me. You were angry and your eyes were so bright and green I could get lost in them.” Cas rested his chin on his hand and stared at Dean a little dreamily. Dean shifted uncomfortably.

“You came over to me and you grabbed me.” Cas squinted a little as if trying to remember. “There may have been kissing. God, I wish I remembered that better.”

Dean balked, but Cas continued without giving him time to object. “I _know_ there were more martinis after that, and everything starts to get fuzzy from there. All I can really remember with any clarity is your eyes.”

Dean’s wasn’t sure what to say to that, and he lost his train of thought briefly watching Cas lick syrup off his lips. He was saved by the sound of his phone buzzing.

“It’s Sam!” Dean jolted in surprise and his knee hit the underside of the table, jostling their plates. He looked up at Cas apologetically.

“Well, answer it,” he said.

Dean picked up the phone, eyeing it like it was about to explode. He answered, bracing for the worst. “Sam?”

 

* * *

 

It turned out, Sam wasn’t nearly as mad as Dean had been expecting. When he told his brother where he’d woken up that morning, Sam had cackled in hysterics for a solid minute. When Dean had tried to get more information out of him about the previous night, Sam had told him between wheezing laughter to bring Cas to the chapel that evening and they could all talk after the wedding.

“You’re really doing this, huh Sammy?”

“Yeah, Dean. I love her. I know you think this was spur of the moment, but it’s really not. I’ve loved her for a long time. You’re the only person I want there with me, but you should know that I’m doing this with or without you.”

“I’ll be there. I wouldn’t miss it for the world, Sammy.”

“Jerk.”  
  
“Bitch.”

Dean let out a sigh of relief. The familiar teasing nicknames had rolled off their tongues like the fight had never happened.

“You really care about him, don’t you?” Cas asked when Dean hung up the phone, a little misty eyed.

Dean popped the remaining strawberry on his plate into his mouth and answered before he had fully finished chewing. “Yeah. He’s my little brother.” He swallowed and cleared his throat.  “And he’s getting married tonight. You down to be my plus one? It’s at the same place so we can probably re-trace our steps and see if we can’t figure out what happened last night. If we actually did get married, I’m sure Sam can help us get it sorted out.”

“Why, Dean Winchester, are you asking me to be your date?”

It wasn’t an entirely unappealing idea, Dean mused. Cas as his date. He looked like he would clean up nice. He gave his head a shake, realizing how absurd he was being.

“Shut up,” he said gruffly, but without malice. He wiped his last piece of toast through the ketchup smears on his plate, licked the crumbs from his fingers, and chugged down the last of his coffee. Turns out the strawberries had been fucking delicious.

Cas was staring at him with a stupidly soft expression on his face, the way Sam went all dewy eyed around small animals.

“What?”

Cas shook his head and his expression reverted to normal. “Nothing. I thought you weren’t hungry?”

“Shut up,” he said again, rolling his eyes.

“Right.” Cas smiled a little wickedly. “Shall we get you suited up for a wedding, then?”


	3. A Wedding

Dean, as it turned out, did not have a suit to wear to the wedding that night. Not that anyone could blame him, really. It’s not like he’d expected to show up in Vegas and need a monkey suit for a wedding, of all things.

Ordinarily, Dean wouldn’t have cared and would have shown up in his jeans, just on principle alone. Cas, however, had convinced him that more formal attire was the better move. Dean was trying to make amends for his behaviour last night after all, and it was a sign of respect to the happy couple, and blah blah blah.

And so, Dean stood in the middle of Cas’s living room modeling not the first, not the second, but the third suit Cas had picked out for him from his closet.

“Turn around.”

Dean obliged, but did so reluctantly and fiddled with the cuffs. He felt like a Ken doll that Cas was dressing up and parading around. With every new suit he was forced to try on, he felt his dignity slipping slowly away. “This is ridiculous,” he said. “Why do you keep making me turn around?”

“I like the view.”

Dean spun around again. “Dude!” He spluttered. “Stop objectifying me.”

It was true though, Dean had to admit. He had caught a glimpse of himself in the reflection of the huge TV screen and he looked pretty damn good. He sucked in his gut on the next turn and smoothed his hands over the lapels nervously.

Cas smirked. “You seem to be more muscular than I am through the shoulders.” Cas licked his lips and his gaze ran lasciviously up Dean’s body.

It was true. Every suit he’d tried on so far had been a little too tight through the chest and shoulders, but baggy in the legs. Dean attempted a few covert glances at Cas’s thighs, which, now that he was looking, did seem quite a lot larger than his own.

“Whatever, it’ll do for one night.”

“Agreed. I’d go with the charcoal one. Let me go grab you a tie, I’ll be right back.”

Left alone in the living room, Dean took in his surroundings again. The TV on the wall was the largest Dean had ever seen. Everything around him was modern, but monotonous shades of grey and black. Balthazar had been chirping contentedly in the corner but his noises turned to angrier squawks when Cas left the room and only Dean remained.

“Yeah, yeah. I don’t like you either,” Dean scowled.

Cas emerged from his bedroom with a light green tie that he claimed would make Dean’s eyes pop and whistled at the parrot affectionately.

“Does he know any words?” Dean asked, gesturing to the bird.

“Some,” Cas said a little absently, rummaging through the closet in the hall for a pair of shoes. “Most are inappropriate; I’ve no idea where he gets them from.” He straightened up, passed a pair of dress shoes over to Dean, then walked back down the hall in the direction of his bedroom.

 _“Bollocks,”_ chirped the bird, once Cas had left the room, and Dean jumped. He moved closer to the birdcage, peering at the parrot.

“Hey there little guy,” Dean tried.

The bird glared at him, then spoke again: _"Dumbass."_

Dean rolled his eyes and returned his attention to his attire. He made several attempts with the tie and gave up in a huff. It wasn’t enough that he had to wear a stupid suit, but now he was expected to wear a tie as well. This was just plain stupid. He wandered down the hall to Cas’s room seeking assistance. The door was halfway open and so he kicked it a little to open it the rest of the way and walked in, still frowning down at his tie and fiddling with it. “Hey Cas, can you—”

He stopped mid sentence. Cas was changing into his own suit but hadn’t quite finished. He stood in the middle of the room in only his dress pants. Dean took in the broad, tanned expanse of chest and his eyes were drawn downward to the dark trail of hair disappearing below his pants. Pants that were sitting low enough on his waist that Dean could see the shape of Cas’s hipbones as he pulled a white dress shirt on. He began to fasten the buttons, one at a time, from the bottom all the way up to the top, and Dean’s stare followed Cas’s hands as he made his way upward.

Cas was fastening the third button from the bottom when Dean realized his mouth was hanging open; he snapped it shut and turned around quickly. In his haste to leave he walked headfirst into the doorframe and swore loudly.

“ _Fuck_ ,” echoed the bird in the other room.

“Dean!” Cas came running over in alarm, and then his hands were on Dean, touching his face, assessing the damage. Dean desperately willed the flush in his face to go down and stared at the ceiling, the floor, then at a random spot to the left of Cas’s head. But Cas took his face gently in both hands and turned it to face his own. Blue eyes bored into his and they stood that way for a long moment, just staring. Dean could feel his heart pounding faster and faster. It must be the adrenaline from hitting his head, Dean reasoned.

“Here, let me.” Cas said, finally. He leaned in and began a series of complicated tucks and folds on Dean’s tie. As he reached around the back of Dean’s neck he was so close that Dean could see every individual fleck of stubble on his cheek, could feel it rub against his own. He shivered. As Cas pulled back slightly, Dean found himself leaning in, chasing the ethereal scent of him that pulled at something deep within Dean.

Cas’s voice was low and husky when he spoke next. “Perhaps we should get going if we don’t want to be late.”

“Right. Yeah.” Dean straightened, blinked rapidly, and gave his head a shake. This was going to be a long night.

 

* * *

 

Sam’s wedding was a tasteful affair.  Nothing, apparently, like the debacle Dean had participated in the previous night.

They arrived before Sam and Eileen and so Dean took the opportunity to talk up the bartender to see if he could glean any information from the previous night. She took one look at the two of them and broke into a gigantic grin.

“Well if it isn’t the happy couple,” she said.

Dean grimaced. “You uh… you remember us, huh?”  
  
“Oh, do I ever!” she laughed.

Dean glanced at Cas nervously and the bartender leaned over, beckoning Dean closer with a crooked finger. Dean looked around and leaned in to hear her over the noise of the bar.

Her voice dropped low and secretive. “You two are the cutest damn couple I’ve ever seen come through here,” she whispered. “And I see a lot of couples.”

Dean straightened up in surprise and turned to Cas who was grinning. “Did you hear that, Dean? We’re cute.”

Dean cleared his throat but was spared from having to say anything further by the arrival of Sam and Eileen.

“Dean!” his little brother called, and made his way over to Dean and Cas.

Dean pulled his brother into a tight hug. When he leaned back, he kept hold of Sam’s shoulders and squeezed in apology. “Sammy, I’m so sorry about last night.”

“Yeah, forget it man. I was pissed at first, but honestly, I’m too happy right now to care about your existential crisis.” Sam shrugged, his smile blinding.

It was true. Dean had never seen Sam quite so excited and full of life. The only other time that came close was when he’d gotten his acceptance letter to Stanford. He hadn’t told Dean about that either when he’d first applied. Dean sighed. That made two of Sam’s happiest life moments ones in which Dean was out of the loop, and he ruined both of them by reacting in anger like he always did.

“Sam, I–” he started, but Sam cut him off and Dean figured that was for the best. He ruined everything, always.

“We’ll talk about it later,” Sam said. “Right now, we want to get married!” He looked over at Eileen and put his arm around her. She was dressed in a white sundress with a teal belt that matched the handkerchief in Sam’s breast pocket. It was a simple dress, but the effect was stunning.

Dean let out a low whistle. “You are so outta his league, Eileen. Are you sure you want to go through with this?” He spoke slowly, turned to face her, and enunciated his words carefully so she could read his lips. He’d only ever talked to Eileen a couple of times before in skype calls with Sam, but he knew the drill.

Eileen laughed and pulled him into a hug. When she leaned back, she wiggled a finger under her chin, then pointed at Cas with a raised eyebrow.

“Oh yeah,” Dean said, and pulled Cas over. He had been standing a little behind Dean staring awkwardly at the floor and fidgeting. “This is my....Cas,” he finished, a little unsure of how to introduce him.

Sam snorted loudly. Eileen turned to him and Sam made a few rapid hand gestures that Dean recognized as finger spelling. She turned back to look at Cas, then at Dean, and her eyes twinkled mischievously.

“Sam Winchester and Eileen Leahy?” came a call from the chapel. “We’re ready for you!”

Sam tapped Eileen on the shoulder to get her attention and translated for her. She smiled and looked to Cas and Dean. “Let’s go. I’m ready for this.”

“I’ll wait out here,” Cas said, and much to Dean’s surprise, he signed the words as well for Eileen’s benefit.

“You can sign?” asked Dean, incredulous.

Cas shrugged. “I’ve always been very fond of languages.” His long fingers moved in intricate motions too fast for Dean to catch. Dean watched in fascination, his heart swelling at the smile that broke out on Sam and Eileen’s faces in response.

“Nah, it’s fine. You’re welcome to join us Cas.” Sam said. “Besides, I guess you’re kind of family now.” He elbowed Dean in the ribs and ushered them both into the chapel.

Dean looked around and tapped Eileen on the shoulder. “Isn’t anyone else coming?”

“We wanted it to be very small,” said Eileen.

It was incredibly small. Only Dean and Cas were present in the chapel with them. Eileen was an only child; her parents had both died when she was young, and any of her close friends were back home in Massachusetts where she was from. Dean had asked about their friends from Stanford but Sam said he didn’t want anyone there but Dean. Well, that wasn’t entirely true. Apparently, he had tried to invite Bobby as well, but he wasn’t able to take time away from the garage.

“He might’ve if you’d bothered to tell him you were getting married,” Dean pointed out huffily, and Cas jabbed him in the ribs before he could go much further with that thought.

Dean felt that their father’s absence from the whole thing was glaring, but decided not to verbalize that particular train of thought with Sam either.

 

* * *

 

The wedding itself didn’t take long at all. Dean watched his little brother sign his vows to his wife in slightly clumsy but practiced movements. Sam and Eileen gazed at one another like there wasn’t another soul in the world. It was sweet, and yet Dean still swallowed a lump in his throat.

He jumped a little when Cas reached over and squeezed his hand. While Dean had been staring at his brother, Cas had evidently been staring at him. His emotions were swirling all over the place and so, without giving it too much thought, Dean squeezed back and was grateful for the reassuring gesture.

Sam and Eileen exchanged rings, a minister said some brief words, and they kissed as husband and wife. Then they all congregated back in the bar for celebratory drinks. Cas eyed his warily and asked the waitress for a glass of water.

“I can’t believe I missed your bachelor party,” Dean groaned. “Please tell me there were strippers.”

Eileen raised an eyebrow, smiling. Sam laughed. “No strippers.”

Dean was crestfallen. “I have failed you as your big brother,” he said with gravitas.

“I told you, man,” Sam said. “We didn’t want this to be a big thing. We didn’t want a bachelor or bachelorette party. We didn’t want bells and whistles and load of people we didn’t know. We just wanted each other.”

Dean sighed. “I really fucked up last night. I’m sorry.” He looked first at Eileen then at Sam imploringly.

“Well I’m not gonna argue that,” said Sam.

Cas cleared his throat and they all turned to look at him. “So, does anyone know what exactly happened last night?” he said, and signed for Eileen.

Sam snorted and Eileen choked a little on her drink. Sam quickly patted her on the back, and then rubbed circles into it once she had cleared her throat. Dean tracked the movement and saw that his hand never moved, sliding down to rest comfortably on the small of her back. She leaned over just slightly into his space so they were closer.

Sam cleared his throat. “Well, Cas. I told my brother here that I was getting married. He reacted… poorly. Started going off about shotgun weddings and rash decisions.”

Dean hung his head in shame. “I’m sorry…"

Eileen reached over to give his hand a squeeze. “I know it was a bit of a shock for you,” she said. Her tone was gentle, but her eyes were twinkling and she looked like she was trying to hold in laughter.

“Right,” said Sam. “You said just about anyone could get married in Vegas and didn’t that undermine the sanctity of the thing.” He laughed. “As if you’ve ever cared about the sanctity of anything.”

“I never—” started Dean, but Sam cut him off.

“I explained that you’d need to get a marriage license, but other than that, you were pretty much free to marry anyone in the place. And I think you took it as a personal challenge, because next thing we knew, you were marching right over to this guy here,” he nodded at Cas, “and getting down on one knee like an idiot.”

Dean reddened and glanced over at Cas, whose face was unreadable.

“Marched right past the leggy blonde who was making sex eyes at him all night, mind you,” Sam added with a wink at Cas.

Dean frowned, trying to remember a blonde woman that night, but came up empty. He cleared his throat. “So, we couldn’t have done anything without a license. We can’t be married, then.”

“Oh, you got the license,” Sam said with a laugh. “The clerk’s office is just around the corner and they’re open ‘till midnight 7 days a week. You guys took off, and I thought that was the last we’d seen of you for the night. But you came back not long after and marched us all into the chapel.”  
  
“I have pictures!” Eileen said excitedly, and shoved her phone at Dean. His eyes bugged out and he scrolled through her photos frantically. It was one thing for Cas to have photographic evidence, but just how many other people had to bear witness to his night of debauchery? He thought of the photos Cas took back at his place where Dean had been naked and eager and he flicked through the photos faster, panic beginning to set in. Many of the pictures were the same as what he’d seen on Cas’s phone that morning, albeit not nearly as blurry. Mercifully, Dean was clothed in all of them and the string of photos ended before they got more x-rated. He let out a sigh of relief and passed the phone back to Eileen who was grinning.

“Why didn’t you stop us?” Dean asked weakly.

“Hey, you were sober,” said Sam, throwing his hands up in defense. “He was sober. Y’all didn’t start pounding back martinis ‘till after. And frankly, you were being a dick, and I was pissed, and it felt like the best revenge at the time was just to let you carry on being an idiot.”

“What I want to know,” said Eileen slyly, “Is what happened when you left the bar last night?”

Dean coughed, choking a bit on his drink. Cas fidgeted nervously beside him.

She squealed excitedly and Sam’s smirk took on a level of smugness Dean hadn’t realized was possible.

 

* * *

 

Eileen left the table to answer a facetime call from a friend back home. While she was gone, Sam outlined the differences between a divorce and an annulment for them.

“You can get a no-fault divorce if you’ve live separately for a year without co-habiting on the grounds of incompatibility.”  
  
“A year?” Dean asked. He looked over at Cas who was frowning. “What about an annulment?”

“It’s faster,” Sam admitted. “If you can get it, that would be ideal, but I’m not sure if it would apply in this case. There would need to have been a lack of consent...or if one of you had already been married that would be an easy out.”  
  
Dean raised his eyebrow at Cas in question, who scowled.

“Right. So that’s a no. What else ya got?”

“Perhaps you could make the case for lack of understanding. Though you knew exactly what you were doing.” He snickered. “An annulment would just void the thing, so it would be like…” he trailed off, searching for the right words.

“Like it never happened,” said Cas flatly.

“Exactly.” Sam agreed.

He handed over a stack of forms. “I’ve printed these off for you. You’ll need to fill them out, both of you sign, and then submit them to the courts here in Vegas. The courthouse probably won’t be open until Monday now,” Sam mused.

Eileen rejoined the table, sidling up to Sam who wrapped an arm around her, pulled her close, and pressed a kiss to the top of her head.

“You’ll make a very good lawyer, Sam” said Cas, and Dean marvelled at the fluidity of his hand gestures as he signed to Eileen.

“Thanks,” Sam said brightly, and Eileen patted him on the arm in agreement. “I’m not doing family law though, which is why I don’t know this too well. I’m more interested in civil rights or environmental law.”

Before Dean knew it, his brother and Cas were talking animatedly about the effects of global warming. He sighed, zoning out a little. His attention returned to the table when Cas excused himself to the washroom. Dean watched him walk away and was startled by Sam snapping his fingers in his face.

“Earth to Dean!”

“Huh?”

“Stop staring at your husband’s ass.”

“I’m not—”

“Whatever. Look, are you sure you want a divorce?”

“What?”

“Hell, maybe it’s not the most conventional start, but there’s something about him. He clearly likes you, and ever since you first laid eyes on him you’ve been tripping all over yourself. I’ve never seen you like this before. Maybe you owe it to both of you to give whatever this is between you a shot.”

“You have chemistry,” Eileen added with a wink.

“You’re both crazy.” Dean scowled.

He was saved by an incoming call from the garage where his car was being kept, and Dean excused himself, hoping to hear that his baby was nearly ready to go. It was a quick job, and Dean wanted to do the work himself; the garage was just going to get him the part he needed. Or at least, he thought they were going to.

He slumped back into his chair at the same time Cas returned from the washroom.

“That was the garage. They won’t have the part in until Tuesday.” It was Saturday night now and Sam and Eileen were heading back to California tomorrow.

“You drove here?” Cas furrowed his brow. “Wouldn’t it have been faster to fly?”  
  
“Oh Dean doesn’t fly,” said Sam, grinning.

“Shut up, Sammy.”

“What? He should know what kind of crazy he married into. Dean’s afraid of flying, Cas. You couldn’t pay him a million dollars to set foot on a plane.”

“I like driving alright?” snapped Dean. Cas was looking at him with a soft expression again and Dean rolled his eyes.

Sam chuckled. “You can have our honeymoon suite after tomorrow night if you want,” he offered, “but you’ll have to pay for the extra nights yourself.”

Dean groaned. There was no way he had enough cash to stay in even a crappy little motel for much longer. “Maybe the garage will let me stay overnight and I can sleep in the backseat of the car.”

Cas scoffed, offended. “Don’t be ridiculous. You can stay with me as long as you need, Dean.”

“Problem solved!” Sam’s smirk stretched so wide, Dean thought he might hurt himself.

“Bitch.”

“Jerk.”

 

* * *

 

Dean could tell that Sam and Eileen were itching to be alone, and so a short time later, they wished them goodnight and parted ways. Dean pulled his brother into a tight bear hug. “Congratulations little brother.” Sam melted into the hug and lingered a little longer than he normally did.

“Thanks Dean.”

Dean pulled back and gave Sam a firm pat on the back. “Guess this is goodbye for now?”

“Come visit us in California when you can,” Eileen said, signing.

The happy couple walked away hand in hand, fingers interlaced. Dean and Cas headed in the opposite direction, back to Cas’s penthouse. Dean chanced a couple of glances down at Cas’s hand swinging between them. His own hand itched to see what it might be like to join hands like Sam and Eileen had. The other hand gripped tightly to the divorce papers Sam had printed off for them before they left.

Once back at Cas’s apartment, they both found they were too exhausted to look at the papers just then. Dean panicked for a brief moment over the sleeping arrangements as Cas walked him down the hallway, but he turned left and ushered Dean into a spare bedroom.

“Sleep well, Dean.”

“You too, Cas. Thanks.”

But it was a long time before Dean fell asleep that night, his thoughts circling back to what Sam had said about giving this thing with Cas a shot. Maybe they did have chemistry.

Dean groaned. It was a mark of just how tired he was that he was even considering the possibility of a relationship. He was being ridiculous. There was no way they could stay married. Dean didn’t _want_ to stay married.

But a tiny niggling sensation in the back of his mind persisted: _what if he was wrong?_


	4. A Lazy Sunday

Dean woke up the next morning with a jolt and it took him a moment to remember where he was. When it came flooding back, he lay staring at the ceiling for a long time, relaxing into the lusciously soft sheets, more pillows than Dean thought was strictly necessary, and a duvet so big and fluffy it nearly swallowed him up. The room Dean found himself in was dusty in places, like it hadn’t been used in a long time. He snooped around, hoping to learn more about Cas, but all of the drawers were empty and the closet bare.

There was no sign of Cas when he finally emerged from the spare bedroom and Dean had learned his lesson about walking into Cas’s room unannounced. He wandered down the hall. There was no sign of Cas, but the TV was on in the living room. Some sort of cooking show was on, and Gordon Ramsay was spewing profane insults.

Balthazar was watching intently, head cocked to one side in such a way that he looked a lot like Cas. Dean wondered if the bird had picked that up from Cas or if it was the other way around.

“ _Motherfucker,”_ the bird chirped.

“You little shit,” Dean laughed. He found a remote for the TV under the bird’s cage and turned it off. Balthazaar ruffled his feathers indignantly and squawked angrily at him: “ _Dumbass_.”

Ignoring him, Dean made his way to the kitchen where he found a note from Cas:

_Gone for a run. Be back soon._

Ugh, Dean thought. No wonder he hit it off so well with Sam.

Taking advantage of the time alone, he called Bobby to let him know that he’d be home later than expected. Bobby grumbled an awful lot about Dean taking more time off work from the garage, but he changed his tune when he told him about Sam’s surprise wedding.

“What in the hell?”

“I know, Bobby! You don’t have to tell me.”

“Are you idjits tryin’ to kill me?”

And so it went. In the end, Bobby softened like Dean knew he would. He promised to check in on John and keep an eye on him until Dean got back. Dean, for his part, was careful to only tell Bobby about one Vegas wedding. After all, his was being annulled soon, so it didn’t really count anyway.

Dean thought about calling his father as well. He decided against it and texted instead:

_Will be home later than expected._

Predictably, there was no response.          

Looking around, Dean realized that the kitchen was beautiful. There was a long granite counter and shiny appliances that all looked like they’d hardly ever been used. As Dean poked around a bit, he realized that was probably close to the truth; Cas’s kitchen wasn’t exactly equipped to cook in. There were expensive dishes in the cupboards, but little food. Some granola bars, instant soup, mac and cheese. He fared no better in the fridge where there were some expired condiments, half empty takeout containers, and not much else. The freezer was stuffed full with microwave dinners.

This was going to be a challenge.

He found a handful of potatoes under the sink that were beginning to resemble a science experiment and he set to dicing them. There were also a few slices of stale bread left, some milk that didn’t smell completely expired, and two eggs. Dean was just laying the French toast down to fry when Cas walked in.

“Hello Dean!” Cas said cheerfully. He was sweaty and glistening from head to toe. Dean’s eyes wandered lower and took in his thin jogging shorts that came short enough to display the thick muscles of his thighs. The shorts also did little to conceal the bulge of his crotch.

“You cook?” Cas broke into a huge grin.

Dean’s eyes snapped back up and he nodded.

“It smells amazing. Let me just take a quick shower and I’ll be right out. I’m sure I must reek to high heaven right now.” He bustled past Dean who caught a whiff of Cas’s scent, which he probably wouldn’t have described as reeking. In fact, he smelled pretty damn good, Dean thought.

He heard the shower running, and images of Cas started running through his mind on a loop. Cas peeling off sweaty clothes. Water running down his body, over his thighs.

He nearly burnt the French toast.

By the time Cas emerged for breakfast, Dean had managed to calm himself down. He had just been surprised, that was all. Caught off guard.

He nearly lost his cool again when he took in Cas’s post-shower hair and the little trickle of water making its way down his neck.

He shoved a plate at him. “French toast.” He muttered.

“I see that. Thank you!” Cas took a huge bite and moaned. “This is incredible, Dean.”

“Yeah, well, it could have been better. You don’t have much to work with here, man.”

“I know, I don’t cook much for myself. I’ve never been very good at it.” He perked up. “Perhaps you could teach me!”

Dean laughed. “Yeah, maybe. Not sure I’ll have enough time though. We should probably take a look at those annulment papers today because my car should be ready by tomorrow. Tuesday at the latest.”

Dean thought that Cas’s face might have darkened a bit at that, but he couldn’t be sure. A second later he was smiling again. “Absolutely, Dean.”

 

* * *

 

After spending the rest of the morning reading over the heavy legal documents, they planned to break for lunch, then fill out the annulment papers. But the afternoon took an unexpected detour when Dean suggested putting on some music.

Cas opened a large mahogany cabinet to reveal an expensive stereo system and Dean practically drooled at the sight, running his hands appreciatively over the speakers and crouching slightly to hit the power button.

He straightened up quickly at the sound that came out and turned to Cas, aghast. “What the fuck is this?”

It was not like any music Dean had ever heard. In fact, he was loathe to call it music at all. It was just a single, low-pitched voice making… noise.

“It’s a Gregorian chant,” said Cas.

Dean stared incredulously and Cas took this as an invitation to explain further. Dean cut him off with a loud snort around the time he started talking about monophonic liturgies and diatonic scales.

“Your parrot doesn’t mind the chanting?” Dean asked, gesturing at the birdcage where Balthazar sat contentedly. When Dean looked over at him, the bird flapped its wings and pronounced Dean a dumbass again.

Cas shot it a scathing look and it quieted down. “No,” Cas said, “He’ll listen to pretty much anything but Celine Dion.”

The monotonous chanting continued and Dean pulled a book from a nearby shelf and held it out in front of himself. When there was a brief space in the chant, he smacked himself in the head.

Cas cocked his head to the side and squinted at him like he was deranged.

“Like the monks from Monty Python?” Dean explained. “You know? _Dono eis requiem_ ,” he chanted, and then smacked himself in the face again.

Cas’s expression didn’t change.

“Alright, that’s it,” Dean said, straightening up. “We’re watching Monty Python and the Holy Grail. But first, I need to get you a better playlist. You got a laptop I can download stuff on?”

“I prefer CDs,” said Cas, pointing to the long shelf of them behind Dean. Dean took a quick survey and found it filled with an array of medieval music, loads of classical shit, and some of those relaxation CDs that mimicked nature sounds. Notably absent was anything from the 20th century.

“Wow. This is going to be a bigger job that I thought.”

 

* * *

 

Cas supplied Dean with his laptop and some blank CDs, and Dean spent the next hour playing dozens of songs for him and carefully selecting his favourite to burn to a CD.

While Dean worked, Cas let Balthazar out of his cage, ostensibly for some exercise. It turned out to be rather ill-advised; they had both underestimated just how forcefully the bird disliked Dean. It chased him all around the apartment, squawking angrily and snapping at him.

Dean dove for cover behind the couch and Cas managed to call the bird back to him. It perched happily on Cas’s shoulder and nuzzled against his face. “Asshole,” it cooed softly.

Dean looked at Cas with a raised eyebrow.

“It’s what he calls me,” Cas explained with an embarassed shrug.

Dean stepped out from behind the couch and towards Cas, causing the bird to flap its wings aggressively again and chirp angrily at Dean. “ _Dumbass_!”

Dean backed away slowly, hands in the air. “He’s awfully protective of you,” Dean said warily.

“Yes, I’m sorry,” Cas muttered as he locked the bird back in its cage and cast it a chastising glare. “Balthazar can be… impetuous. We don’t get many visitors. But he’s never been quite this aggressive before.”

When Dean was finished with his CD, he presented it proudly to Cas who eyed it with skepticism but nonetheless placed it carefully on his other shelf with the rest of his discs.

Satisfied that Cas’s musical education had been fulfilled, Dean set to downloading Monty Python and hooked it into Cas’s television. A brief conversation ensued, in which Dean was horrified to learn that Cas’s film repertoire was almost as lacking as that of his music.

They watched Monty Python, which somehow led to Star Wars next. Cas actually owned the Star Wars DVDs and pulled them off the shelf proudly, still wrapped in cellophane.

“You own them and you’ve never watched them?” Dean asked.

Cas shrugged. “I’ve never had occasion.”

“Well, we have occasion now.” Dean said.

But the occasion was put on hold for a time as they debated the proper viewing order.

“I don’t understand why you want to start with episode four, that makes no sense,” huffed Cas.

Cas was not easily swayed, but in the end, he deferred to Dean’s way of thinking once Dean had elucidated all the merits of watching in production order rather than chronologically. They ordered pizza for dinner which arrived halfway through episode four and shared a meat lovers as the Falcon was captured by the Death Star’s tractor beam.

When the credits rolled, Dean yawned, stretched, and turned to look at Cas who was still staring intently at the screen.

Dean laughed. “I told you it was good.”

“We have to watch the next one!” Cas declared.

“Yeah. We gotta sort these papers out first.” Dean gestured at the annulment papers scattered across the coffee table. “We’ve put it off all day.”

“Fine,” Cas sighed with exaggeration. “You fill out your part, I’m going to make us some popcorn.” Cas slid the papers across the coffee table to Dean then disappeared into the kitchen.

Dean furrowed his brow, trying to remember his social security number. He was filling out his address in Kansas when Cas returned with a bowl of hot, buttery popcorn and sank onto the couch much closer to Dean than he had been before. Not quite close enough that they were touching, but if Dean were to spread his leg out a bit, their knees would bump together. He kept his leg very still.

“I’ve thought about it, and I don’t think I can wait to watch the next one,” Cas announced. “We can do this later, can’t we?”

Dean supposed they could. It shouldn’t take that long, and it was still early in the evening They had time for one more movie, and then they could take care of business after. He left the papers scattered on the coffee table and relaxed back into the couch. Cas pointed the clicker at the TV and _The Empire Strikes Back_ began.

Dean munched on the popcorn that Cas had settled in between them, and tried very hard to focus on the movie and not on the man sitting so close to him. He eventually relaxed, and by the time Han Solo was frozen in carbonite, he was so into the movie he had forgotten all about Cas. He was soon reminded when he reached into the popcorn bowl absent mindedly and bumped hands with him.

“Oh, sorry,” he mumbled, and pulled his hand back, startled.

Cas seemed surprised as well and jumped a little. The popcorn bowl, which had been precariously perched on the couch, toppled over.

“Shit.” Dean scrambled to the floor to clean up at the same time Cas did and they bumped foreheads. Hard.

“Shit!” he said, a little louder this time.

Cas started laughing, and hit pause on the movie. His nose scrunched up, and Dean felt laughter start to bubble up in him as well. They sat there on the floor laughing for far too long, and Dean was wheezing by the time they had started to calm down, not really sure why anything about this was so funny.

Cas reached over and patted him on the back brusquely. Dean wiped away tears from laughing so hard, his breathing beginning to return to normal. He let out a long sigh. Cas had stopped patting him, but his hand was still sitting warm and heavy on his back. He turned to look more fully at Cas, and found him leaning impossibly close.  

“You’ve got a bit of a bump,” Cas observed. He smoothed back Dean’s hair, and pressed a soft, chaste kiss to his forehead.

Dean went perfectly still.

Cas gave a sad sort of smile, and slid his hands down from Dean’s hair to cup his face instead. He ran his thumb over Dean’s cheekbone, soft and gentle. Dean felt it everywhere, spreading through his limbs and curling low in the base of his spine. He shuddered and closed his eyes. When he opened them again, Cas’s face was only inches from his own, blue eyes boring into him.

“Dean,” Cas murmured, and Dean had never before heard his name uttered with such affection and desire– and Cas was leaning in further still.

“Dean, is this okay?” he whispered, a note of pleading in his voice.

Dean wanted to say yes but he couldn’t get the word out. He just opened and closed his mouth helplessly, like an idiot. A beat passed and Cas started to withdraw his hands. Dean panicked, suddenly more scared of Cas not kissing him than he was of what would happen if he did. He grabbed Cas’s hands before he could pull them back all the way and held them in place.

“Yes!” he nearly shouted, a split second too late and much too loudly. “Yes…” he said, more quietly. He swayed closer into Cas’s warmth and was met with lips against his. Though he couldn’t see him, he could feel Cas smiling.

It started polite enough, Cas’s lips grinning against his. It was a little strange, Dean thought, but not at all unpleasant. Cas’s stubble brushed against his own and it was a delicious sort of counterpoint to the softness of Cas’s lips. Cas’s thumb resumed its soothing strokes over his cheekbone, while his other hand moved upwards and tangled into his hair, tracing the lines of his neck along the way. It’s was gentle and sweet; and then, suddenly, it wasn’t. Cas’s tongue was in his mouth, his teeth nipping at his bottom lip with frenzied urgency and Dean let out a long, low moan. He pushed back into Cas’s mouth, equally desperate for the taste of him. He could feel himself getting hard in his jeans and he squirmed uncomfortably.

And then, all at once, and much too soon for Dean’s liking, it was over. Cas pulled away and Dean swayed on the spot, dizzy with it all.

“Wow,” Cas said, and his voice sounded a whole octave lower and more gravelly than normal. “That was…”

“Yeah,” Dean agreed. “Wow.”

They sat there a moment on the floor, both swivelling back to lean against the couch.

The pause timed out on the movie then, and the television came on. It was tuned to a documentary channel and the droning voice of a British narrator bellowed through the speakers making them both jump. Cas scrambled to turn the volume down and Dean scrambled to his feet, shuffling to adjust himself so his hard-on wasn’t visible.

“It’s getting late.” Dean announced, even though it wasn’t. “We should… go… to bed…”

Cas looked at him, his eyes huge and earnest.

“I’ll sleep in the spare room,” Dean clarified hastily. “If that’s okay.”

“Of course Dean. Sleep well.”

“Yeah, you too.” Dean started to leave, feeling Cas’s eyes on him. He turned back when he got to the edge of the room and Cas quickly averted his gaze. He had settled back into the couch, legs curled under himself.

“It’s on the flight patterns of migratory birds.” Cas gestured at the documentary that was playing and clutched a pillow to his lap. “I thought I’d just… tune in for a bit before I go to bed.” His face was bright red.

“Nerd.” Dean muttered, and continued to his room, smiling.

 _“Goodnight dumbass,”_ came the sound of Balthazar from the far corner of the room.

 

* * *

 

As he lay in bed staring up at the ceiling, Dean pressed his fingers to his lower lip, feeling the faintly lingering sensation of Cas’s lips on his. It was much later, just before he finally slipped into a fitful sleep, that he remembered they hadn’t finished with the annulment papers.

There was always tomorrow.


	5. Trouble in Paradise

Dean had tossed and turned the whole night thinking about the kiss. Were things going to be awkward? Would Cas want to kiss him again? Did Dean want Cas to kiss him again? Anxiety settled low in Dean’s gut and his brain swirled through endless different scenarios all night long.

When morning finally came, Dean woke with a start to the smell of burning and the blare of a smoke alarm.

He rushed into the hallway and stumbled bleary eyed down to the kitchen which was billowing with black smoke. In the middle of it all, Cas was coughing and waving an oven mitt back and forth a little uselessly, trying to clear the air.

“Cas?!” Dean shouted.

Cas spun around and froze like a deer in headlights. Then his shoulders sagged and he gestured around the kitchen in dismay. “I tried to cook breakfast.”

“I can see that,” Dean smiled. “You’re doing a bang-up job of it, too.” He reached around him to pull the offending pan off the burner and dump it in the sink. It looked like it may have contained eggs at one point but now more closely resembled black tar. He switched everything off.

There was smoke coming from the oven too, and Dean peeked in to find a plate of what appeared to be pancakes just beginning to singe on the edges. He yanked the oven mitts away from Cas and pulled the plate out, carefully setting it on the counter.

He clapped his hands together and spun around on the spot, evaluating. Satisfied that there was nothing else burning, he pushed a kitchen chair over to the center of the kitchen, stood on top of it, and yanked the smoke alarm out of the ceiling. It continued to blare mercilessly, until he managed to wrench the batteries out of it and then it fell blissfully silent.

Dean stepped back down onto the floor and surveyed the damage. There was still a lot of smoke, but not enough that an open window or two wouldn’t fix. The blackened eggs were still sizzling in the sink, emitting the occasional hiss. The pancakes looked like they might be salvageable, though why they had been stacked on a plate and cooking in the oven was beyond Dean’s comprehension.

There was a half empty carton of eggs on the table, one of which had fallen to the floor and cracked open, yolk smeared everywhere as though it had been stepped in. A loaf of bread balanced precariously on the counter, threatening to topple over. A gooey white substance that Dean deduced to be pancake batter was splattered everywhere— the counter, the cupboards, the floor— as though there had been some sort of explosion. There was a large splotch on the ceiling that was steadily dripping down with a plop, plop, plop.

Dean turned full circle to look at Cas, doing nothing to hide his incredulity. There was even, he noted with amazement, pancake batter splattered in the man’s hair. Cas looked startled and bewildered, and held up his hands in a helpless, sticky mess.

“What the hell, man?” Dean laughed.

Cas appeared too stunned to speak. It wasn’t until Dean started moving again, crouching to tackle the broken egg first, that Cas sprang into action.

He knelt next to Dean. “Please, let me,” he mumbled. He scooped as much of the egg goop into his hands as he could manage and stood up. “I’m sorry if the alarm woke you. I… I wanted you to sleep in… I wanted to surprise you…”

“By blowing the place up?” Dean asked.

“By making you breakfast,” Cas sighed. “I had groceries delivered. You complained yesterday that I didn’t have anything, but you still made such delicious food. I wanted to return the favour.”

Cas looked completely crestfallen and a little like a lost puppy, and Dean felt something squeeze in his chest. He realized then that he may have spent all night worrying about nothing. It was just Cas. Sweet, dorky, Cas; who was the very picture of a nervous wreck himself.

“This is totally salvageable,” Dean lied. “You clean up, and I’ll finish cooking, okay?

Cas nodded glumly.

 

* * *

 

Twenty minutes later the kitchen was starting to look like a kitchen again, and Dean was getting to work on some fresh omelettes and hash browns. Cas’s pancakes didn’t actually look all that bad. It turned out he’d been trying to keep them warm in the oven, but instead of putting the warmer on, he’d set it to broil. Dean had managed to rescue them just in time. A minute more and they’d have been charcoal like the eggs.

“See, you want to cook them until they just start to get brown on the edges,” Dean explained to Cas, who was peering over his shoulder at the hashbrowns. “Low heat. If you cook ‘em too fast, they’ll burn for sure. Pass the pepper.”

Cas passed a pepper grinder and Dean gave it a few twists. “Some other herbs would be good if you had them. Start out with just a little seasoning, and keep tasting. You can always add more.”

He singled out a piece of potato on the end of his spatula and turned to hand it to Cas. Cas, however, opened his mouth expectantly, his eyes closed. Momentarily caught off guard, Dean moved to place the hashbrown carefully on Cas’s tongue. He licked his own lips as he watched Cas’s curl around the end of the spatula.

Cas moaned his admiration, and Dean quickly turned his attention back to the stovetop.

“Right, okay. For the omelettes, you gotta flip them at just the right moment. If you wait too long they’ll burn, and if you flip ‘em too soon they’ll fall apart and run all over the place.”

“Can I try?” Cas asked, with an edge of nervousness.

“Sure.” Dean shuffled a little to one side and Cas moved in. He passed the spatula over to Cas, then leaned around him from behind, taking his hand in his to guide him.

“It’s a lift and flip motion, real quick.” Dean demonstrated the movement in the air a few times, moving Cas’s hand with his so he’d get a feel for it.

“Lift and flip,” Cas muttered, intensely focused.

“You got it!” Dean smiled.

He let go, and peered over Cas’s shoulder as he made to flip the first omelette. They were so close that Dean could have rested his chin on Cas’s shoulder, could have wound his arms around his waist. He cleared his throat and carefully angled his hips away.

The omelette slipped a little, but all in all it turned out okay. Cas looked up over his shoulder at Dean and beamed. “It worked!”

“Yeah,” Dean laughed. “Pour the OJ, we’re just about ready.”

 

* * *

 

Breakfast was a resounding success. Omelettes and toast and hashbrowns, and Dean dutifully tried the pancakes that Cas had come within seconds of burning. They were lumpy in places and a little raw in others, but Dean covered them in syrup and declared them delicious. Cas narrowed his eyes suspiciously, but smiled all the same.

As they were cleaning up after, Cas talked animatedly about the plight of honeybees and Dean realized that he was really starting to like the guy. In fact, he really hoped they’d be able to remain friends after all of this. He liked his dorky little lopsided smile and the way his head always cocked to one side when he was confused or thinking hard about something. He liked the way his eyes sparkled when he was excited about something unspeakably boring, like honeybees or the migratory patterns of birds. He liked how his hair was perpetually mussed up and how Cas was brutally honest in all things, never caring to sugar coat something. He liked his lips and how they were just a little bit chapped. Dean realized then that he had been staring at Cas’s lips as he prattled on about pollination, and he quickly dropped his gaze. Unfortunately, it fell on Cas’s crotch instead. Dean found he also really liked the bulge just faintly visible through Cas’s sweatpants and the way they pulled a little around his thighs.

Dean cleared his throat. “I can’t believe we spent all of yesterday watching movies. We’re in Vegas! What a waste.”

Cas looked down. “I enjoyed it. I… don’t often go out anyway.”  
  
“But you live in Vegas!” said Dean incredulously. “Surely you must be living it up here.”   
  
“I’m a freelancer,” he said. “I don’t have an office to go to, and there’s not often a lot of reason to leave the apartment.”

“Huh,” mused Dean. “So why live here?”

Cas looked at him with squinted eyes, considering. Dean felt a bit like he was being sized up. Finally, Cas sighed, and spoke.

“I’m not on the best of terms with my family,” he said quietly. “I sort of…ran away. Or got kicked out, depending on your point of view. I’ve always been a huge disappointment and the perennial black sheep, so I guess I figured if I was going to fall out of grace with them, I may as well go all the way. The city of sin seemed the appropriate choice.” He smiled weakly.

“Most of the time I just spend in here though.” He gestured out the window at the Vegas skyline. “Turns out, I really quite like it here. It’s beautiful, and I like being up here looking out at all the lights. Sometimes if you’re out on the balcony and there’s a strong wind, it feels almost like you’re flying.”

Dean shuddered at the thought. “What happened with your family?” he asked. “I can’t see how anyone could be disappointed in you.”

Cas’s face darkened, and Dean backtracked quickly.

“It’s okay,” he said. “You don’t have to tell me. I don’t–”

“No, it’s fine,” Cas said. “You told me about your family. It’s actually...well, let’s just say we have some things in common.” He cleared his throat. “My family is very religious, so…” he trailed off and looked at Dean expectantly.

Dean stared, and Cas let out a deep sigh.

“So, being gay and all, I wasn’t exactly the son they were hoping for.”

“Oh,” said Dean. “Oh, I’m so sorry, Cas.” He thought of his own father, and how he might react if… but no, Dean couldn’t think about that now.

“My mother died of an aneurysm just a few days after I came out. My father was never the same after she was gone either, and both he and my brother Michael have always blamed me for her death.”

Dean was aghast. “But, that’s not fair! That’s not even–”

“I know,” Cas said dismissively.

Dean scowled. “Your dad sounds like a real dick.”

“Yeah, well, he’s dead now too so it doesn’t matter.”

“Oh god, I’m sorry.” Dean backpedaled again. “When did you lose him?”

“Last Tuesday.”

Dean’s jaw dropped. “What?”

Cas sighed. “I feel a lot of things, but sadness isn’t one of them. Relief, perhaps? Is that terrible? But really, I lost my father a long time ago, and I’ve already grieved that. Michael only saw fit to call me about it on Friday once the funeral was over. I’m not terribly sorry that I missed it if I’m being perfectly honest, but we fought, and well, that’s how I found myself in a bar watching you and thinking that just maybe I wanted to do something a little crazy.” He looked up at Dean and smiled, giving a small shrug. “Like I said, I don’t normally go to bars or drink much at all, really. It was just… extenuating circumstances.”

“Cas, I’m sorry…” Dean muttered, completely at a loss for words.

“Don’t be. I had a wonderful weekend with you, and it’s really a quite fitting way to pay tribute to my father. He always said he’d see me marry another man over his dead body.” He winked at Dean. “He would have been appalled and none too fond of you, I’m sure.”

“A mutual feeling, no doubt,” muttered Dean.

“So,” Cas said, reaching up to put the last dish away. “What’s next?”

Dean sighed. “We should probably take a look at those annulment papers, eh?”

Cas sighed. “Yes, I suppose we should.”

 

* * *

 

Back in the living room, Dean spread the papers out on the coffee table again. His car would be ready the following morning, so he was anxious to get everything finished today. Though, the thought of leaving Vegas– of leaving Cas– was beginning to make Dean feel a bit… _something_. He wasn’t sure what, just yet, but there was an uncomfortable feeling brewing in his gut whenever he thought of leaving. Perhaps he was just coming down with something. Brushing the thought aside, he prepared to get down to business.

Cas, however, seemed altogether unenthused about the prospect, and he collapsed onto the couch with a huff.

“Look, I know paperwork is a drag, but we gotta get through this, right?” Dean said, settling next to him on the couch, a respectable distance away.

Cas just muttered noncommittally.

“What’s your problem, man?” Dean asked, leaning over to poke him lightly in the side.

Cas let out a colossal sigh. “It’s just this whole divorce thing.” He gestured at the papers strewn across the table. “I wish…” he trailed off, looking around the apartment until his gaze fell on Dean and he went silent. “Never mind,” he mumbled.

“No, what?” Dean asked. He leaned forward and slid a little closer to Cas, concerned.

“It just seems a shame, is all.” Cas said. “I married a… a Greek God.” He gestured haphazardly at Dean. “I had what was likely the best sex of my life with you, and I don’t even remember it.” He turned to face Dean fully, staring intensely. “I just wish I remembered being with you,” he said very softly, with another sad, slow smile. He dropped his head heavily, and stared at his lap.

Not for the first time, Dean was stunned into silence. He was finding that he didn’t like it much when Cas’s smiles were the sad kind.

“I do too,” he whispered.

Cas’s head shot up comically fast to look at Dean with wide eyes. “What?”

“I wish I remembered,” Dean said. “I don’t… I’ve always… I’m not sure…” Dean cleared his throat, not really sure himself what he was trying to say. He pondered a moment, then tried again. “What’s it like?” he asked.

Cas squinted at him in confusion.

“Sex,” Dean explained. And then much more quietly, “With a guy.”

“What’s sex like with a guy?” Cas repeated, frowning.

Dean looked up at him hopefully.

Cas tipped his head to the side very slowly and seemed to consider Dean for a long moment.

“It’s… pleasant,” Cas said carefully.

“Pleasant?”

“Uh, yes.” Cas shrugged.

Dean persisted, unable to stop himself now. “It doesn’t, you know… hurt at all?”

Cas smiled then, and chuckled. “Not if you do it right.”

Dean nodded to himself, then froze at Cas’s next words.

“I could show you.”

 

* * *

 

Dean Winchester was no prude. In fact, he was a goddamn rock star in the sack. How different could it really be with another guy? Dean weighed his options, and in the end, he was too curious to say no. And, if he was being brutally honest, too turned on by the man in front of him with the puppy dog eyes that could rival Sam’s.

“I’m in,” Dean announced, and smirked at the surprised look on Cas’s face. “Hell, don’t most divorcing couples get a last hurrah or something?” He winked. “This can be ours. What happens in Vegas and all.”

“I suppose.” Cas squinted at him. “Are you sure?”

Dean nodded and the words were barely out of his mouth before Cas was on him, kissing him furiously, his hands tangling in Dean’s hair and pulling just slightly. He gasped at the sudden flash of pain and Cas pulled back quickly, his hands running over Dean’s hair in gentle, soothing motions.

“I’m sorry,” he muttered, taking a shaky breath to compose himself.

Dean caught Cas’s eye and flashed a sly smile. “Don’t be.”

They stumbled towards the bedroom, peeling layers of clothing off as they went. While trying to pull his shirt off without breaking their kiss, Dean’s elbow connected with the lamp in the living room and it shattered to the floor.

“Ugh,” Cas groaned between frantic kisses. “I just replaced that bulb.”

Dean laughed. “It’s a terrible place for a lamp anyway. We’ve broken it twice now.”

He pushed Cas up against the wall in the hallway, leaning in to suck bruising kisses down the line of Cas’s neck. This he could do. This was familiar. The scratching sensation and burn of stubble against his lips was new, but intoxicating, and Dean savoured the salty tang of sweat on Cas’s skin, wondering what he would taste like further down. He bit gently on the flesh of Cas’s shoulder and was rewarded with a sharp inhale of breath.

If there was one thing Dean was good at, it was sex. He might even be able to show Cas a few things.

They stumbled a few more feet down the hall and Cas managed to pin Dean to the wall on the other side of the hallway. He moved one knee between Dean’s legs and ground himself against Dean’s hip, letting out a low, stuttering moan.

This was what he needed, Dean reasoned. A good, hard, fast fuck and he’d be able to put this guy out of his mind and go on with his life. A quick, no-strings-attached night of fun, and Dean would be able to stop fantasizing about what it would be like, would be able to sleep at night without dreaming about blue eyes and all the different things those sinful lips could do.

“Yeah,” Dean muttered. “Come on, Cas.”

There was a moment of inelegant fumbling as belt buckles were undone and zippers pulled down. Cas’s hands were in Dean’s pants, reaching around to cup his ass. He squeezed, and pulled Dean’s groin towards him, rocking their hips together. And then Cas’s hands were down the front of his pants, and Dean gasped at the feeling of cool air as Cas freed his cock from the confines of his pants. Firm hands wrapped around his length and stroked him quickly.

Dean pawed at the front of Cas’s pants in blind desperation, until he finally got a hand inside. His hand wrapped around Cas’s cock, and Dean’s eyes fluttered shut at the feeling. The hefty weight of it, hot and throbbing.

Cas pulled Dean’s hand away and pulled his own pants partway down. He lined their hips up again, and their cocks slid together, slippery with pre-come. Dean’s head fell back against the wall with a loud thump and he let out an embarrassingly high pitched keen. He had to squeeze his eyes tightly shut at the overwhelming sensation and panicked slightly at the realization that this could all be over a little too quickly. Desperately, he thought of Sam’s farts and Bobby’s dirty underwear, and he breathed in and out carefully until he had better control of himself.

Cas didn’t seem keen to cool things down though. He pulled back abruptly and dropped to the floor, pulling Dean’s pants down with him. He nosed all around Dean’s groin, pressing soft kisses to his hip and inner thighs, and Dean jolted at the feel of Cas’s stubble down there as his cock rubbed against Cas’s cheek. Cas licked at his balls, rolling one in his mouth, before licking a long stripe up the underside of Dean’s dick and letting his tongue lap up the pre-come that had formed at the tip. Dean’s legs began to quiver and Cas finally took pity on him and took him fully in his mouth. He sucked hard, inching lower until his nose was buried in Dean’s pubic hair, then swallowed around him.

As Dean’s vision swam and his knees were just about to give out, he realized he might be in a bit over his head. There was likely nothing at all he could teach the bona fide sex god going to town on his dick.

All at once, Cas stood up again, and pulled Dean down the hall into his bedroom. He pushed him lightly, and Dean staggered backwards towards the bed. They quickly shed the last of their clothes and Cas crowded into Dean’s space, flooding Dean’s senses with the heady scent of him. Dean let his hands roam tentatively along the hard muscle of Cas’s chest and watched blue eyes darken in lust.

Cas surged in to kiss him again, more forcefully than before, and Dean’s lips parted eagerly. He let out a soft moan at the taste of himself on Cas’s lips.

Cas pulled back, and with a firm hand to Dean’s chest, shoved him down onto the bed. Dean fell back, grinning, and landed with a soft thump. Cas came sidling after him, his weight pressing Dean down into the mattress. That too, was a new sensation. Cas was a solid line of hard, unrelenting muscle where before it had always been soft flesh and curves. The hot, heavy weight bearing down on him made Dean feel surprisingly vulnerable in a way he never had before. But it also made him feel oddly safe and he was startled to realize just how much he trusted the man sprawled on top of him, pinning him to the bed.

Blue eyes swarmed into his vision again. Cas’s face was contorted in lust, his pupils blown wide. He ground down once, slowly, and Dean’s head fell back at the friction, his legs coming up to wrap around Cas’s waist.

But Cas’s touch turned suddenly tentative again. As Dean tightened his legs and tried to thrust upward, urging him on, Cas’s hands came up to frame Dean’s face and he held him still. He peered down at Dean, his expression serious.

“Dean?”

“Mmm.”

“Will you tell me if you want me to stop?”

Dean let out a breathy laugh, and tried to school his voice into something more casual. “Don’t see that happening any time soon, buddy. But yeah,” he added hastily when Cas frowned at him. “Sure thing.”

Cas continued to stare at him, ignoring the way Dean was trying wiggle his hips. One hand brushed softly against Dean’s face and a thumb traced his freckles. “There are many other ways I can bring you pleasure if you’re worried about it hurting.”

Dean shivered at the bold intensity of Cas’s words and the truth he knew they contained. But he quickly suppressed it, snorted instead. “I’m not some delicate flower here, Cas. You’re not going to break me.”

Cas’s head tilted slightly to one side as he considered him.

Dean grinned. “Let’s get this show on the road, shall we?”

Cas took one last look at his face, nodded solemnly, then began to slide lower down Dean’s body, pressing wet kisses all the way down. He took Dean’s leaking cock in his hand, making a fist, and moving slowly but firmly up and down the shaft, making Dean sigh loudly in relief. Cas leaned down to tongue at the slit, then around the underside of the head. Dean squirmed, and Cas dropped his hands to hold Dean’s hips firmly in place.

Holding him down, he took Dean into his mouth fully, swallowing him down. Dean let out a ragged moan and his hands flew up to tangle in Cas’s hair. It was almost unbearable, the tight, wet heat of his mouth, and Dean’s body began to lock up, muscles clenching. Just when he thought he was about to lose it, Cas pulled off and looked up to meet Dean’s eyes.

The sight took Dean’s breath away. Cas looked completely debauched; his eyes hooded, cheeks flushed, lips wet and swollen. Dean lay panting, and realized that he probably looked much the same.

Cas moved lower down, nuzzling at Dean’s balls again. One hand moved to wrap around his cock, stroking him up and down, as Cas sunk lower still and licked a wet stripe along his perineum. Dean swore loudly, and his whole body clenched.

Cas chuckled, and looked up at Dean. “Relax,” he said, then peppered soft little kisses all along the inside of his thighs. The hand on his dick began to move faster, up and down, the thumb occasionally sliding across the slit and smearing through pre-come.

“Cas,” he breathed, and struggled to sit partway up. With his other hand, Cas pushed Dean firmly back onto the bed, and Dean groaned. “You gotta hurry up, man. Fuck me already.”

Cas hummed, and kissed the tip of Dean’s cock, which was painfully hard now and leaking. Without warning, Dean felt a finger move low and circle his rim. It was a soft touch, just a gentle brush against his skin, but Dean’s whole body convulsed and before he knew what was happening, he was coming all over his stomach in hot, thick streaks.

“Oh fuck,” he gasped. “Oh, holy fuck.”

He chanced a glance down at Cas who was staring up at him, hair askew, eyes wide in wonder. Dean squeezed his eyes shut and could feel shame heating his face.

“God, I’m sorry. I’m like a fucking teenager. I didn’t mean to… I’m normally more…”

“Dean,” Cas interrupted, his voice hoarse and ragged with longing.

Dean opened his eyes. The dazed expression on Cas’s face had been replaced with a look of pure affection and fondness, and Dean wilted under the intensity of it.

“You’re so beautiful,” Cas whispered.

Dean let his head flop back on the pillow, his cheeks aflame. He had to crane his neck again though when Cas ran a finger through the stickiness pooled on his stomach, brought it up to his own mouth and tasted, his tongue running sinfully over his fingers.

Fuck, that was hot. And oddly gentle. The tender affection Dean had felt from Cas was beginning to swell to its breaking point, and Dean had a sudden burning desire to take Cas in his arms and just hold him, bury his face in that hair, and never let go.

This was not good. This was not shaping up to be a quick and easy fuck. Not that they’d even managed to get to the fucking part. Dean sighed.

Cas looked up and held Dean’s gaze as he licked his fingers clean. “Would you like to keep going?”

And fuck yes, Dean wanted that. He wanted more, wanted everything that Cas was willing to give him. But something made him hesitate. Perhaps it was the look in Cas’s eyes; his expression was soft again, and he gazed at Dean with unchecked affection. It was unnerving, and the level of intimacy flooding between them in that moment was more than Dean could bear. If he didn’t get a handle on himself quickly, he’d be in deep trouble.

Making up his mind, Dean rolled onto his stomach, reasoning that it would be much easier not to have to look Cas in the eye anymore. He could close himself off here, facedown in a pillow. It would just be sensation. Just two bodies moving, and his treacherous heart could stay well out of the way.

Again though, Cas had different plans.

Dean lost track of time entirely as Cas slowly dismantled him piece by piece, until Dean was a sobbing, quivering mess. A long time must have passed, because Dean found himself hard again, leaking onto the sheets beneath him. He tried to move, tried to generate some friction, but it was just not enough.

Cas worked him open with his tongue and fingers, slow and methodical. Dean couldn’t see Cas’s face from where he was buried in the pillow, but he would have bet money that Cas had that little frown that he made whenever he was intensely focused. Every so often Cas stopped and pulled out completely. Ignoring Dean’s protests to hurry the fuck up, he crawled back on top of him, pressing him firmly into the mattress, and trailing feather light kisses all across his shoulders and down his back, letting his own cock rub teasingly at the line of Dean’s ass. Then he slid back down and resumed his ministrations.

Dean heard the click of the lube bottle for the umpteenth time, and then a new sound: the crinkling of a condom wrapper. His heart began to pound faster in anticipation.

Cas ran a soothing hand over his hip. “Relax Dean,” he murmured.

“Hurry up,” Dean growled. He jolted when Cas bit down on his ass, then laved tender kisses over the spot.

And then finally—finally—Cas was nudging at his entrance. Dean squeezed his eyes shut and Cas inched forward, inch by agonizing inch. He had just barely breached him and Dean let out a short gasp at intensity of the stretch. Cas stilled and ran his hands soothingly over Dean’s ass, kneading and stroking.

Dean let out a long, shaky breath.

“Dean?” Cas asked, his voice trembling.

“Yeah, Cas. I’m good.”

“Are you–”

“Hurry up and fuck me already, would you?” Dean was immensely grateful for the position he had settled on so he could hide his face in the pillow and Cas wouldn’t see how red he was getting.

Finally, Cas inched forward, slow and careful, until he was fully seated. Then he stilled again, stroking Dean’s hips. The slight burning sensation gave way to a feeling of incredible fullness. Cas leaned to drape himself over Dean’s back and the change in position had Dean seeing stars. He moaned uncontrollably into the pillow and Cas stroked his hair, kissing down the back of his neck.

And then Cas started moving. Slow and gentle still, but the sensation was unspeakably intense. Cas whispered softly into his ear, little murmurs that Dean couldn’t make out, but that sounded suspiciously affectionate. Frowning, he pushed back to meet Cas’s thrusts, urging him to pick up the pace and fuck him harder. He was rewarded with a loud groan from Cas, whose rhythm stuttered for a moment.

Dean smirked, but before he had a chance to fully savour his victory, Cas pulled him upright and close against his chest. One arm wound around his waist, the other snaked across his chest to flick at a nipple, and Dean’s head fell back heavily against Cas’s shoulder. Dean’s entire weight was being held up by Cas, who started to move faster, the slap of skin against skin echoing in the room.

Dean’s dick throbbed, swinging with every insistent thrust from Cas. He made to reach down but Cas swatted his hand away, and Dean whined. Slowly, the arm around Dean’s waist moved lower, trailing through the come and fresh pre-come that had smeared on Dean’s stomach. It inched closer, but just shy of where Dean wanted it, and he let out a loud, desperate moan. Any inhibitions he may have had vanished in a flash and Dean found himself begging.

“Cas.. please. Please, I need… fuck.. Cas… please, please, please.” His vision blurred, and Dean was stunned to realize that he was crying it was so fucking good.

Cas nipped the side of his ear and continued to flick his nipple relentlessly. He finally wrapped a firm hand around Dean’s dick and growled into his ear.

“Come for me, Dean.”

He stroked once, twice, and then Dean was coming again, harder this time, the orgasm ripping forth from somewhere much deeper within him.

He was dimly aware of a shout and a bone deep groan from somewhere behind him before he collapsed face-down in a heap, his own stickiness smearing beneath him. Cas landed warm and heavy on top of him, but managed to roll them both to one side slightly so that he was curled tightly around Dean’s back. He could feel Cas’s stubble between his shoulder blades as his face burrowed in and his gasping breath fell hot and heavy on his skin.

Unless Dean was very much mistaken, he was the little spoon in this arrangement. Had he the strength, he might have protested more, but all he could manage was just to lay there, panting, and waiting for the ringing in his ears to fade away.

“Holy shit,” he finally managed.

Cas let out a low chuckle from behind him and kissed him between his shoulder blades. “Don’t move. I’ll be right back.”

Cas got up from the bed, and Dean shivered at the loss of warmth. He wasn’t gone long before he returned and started wiping Dean down with a soft, warm cloth. His touch was exceedingly gentle, his dark hair damp with sweat. When he finished, Dean made to get up, but Cas pulled him back against his chest, arms locked firmly around him.

It was warm and safe, and Dean felt himself beginning to get sleepy. But as much as Dean wanted to stay there forever, he knew he couldn’t. He couldn’t lose himself here, couldn’t get too comfortable. This was just supposed to be a fun time.

Desperate to put some distance between them and regain some semblance of control, Dean forced a laugh and said weakly, “It’s going to be kinda hard to divorce you after that.”

The arms around his waist tightened their hold.

“Dean?”

“Mmm.” Dean wiggled a bit, figuring it was definitely time now to get up before they crossed the line from no-strings sex to post-coital cuddling.

“What if we didn’t?” Cas asked.

Dean grunted, managing to sit up and squirm out of Cas’s hold. “What?”

Cas rolled into the space that Dean vacated and reached up to trace his fingers down Dean’s back. He trailed his fingers up and down, swirling in loops and curves over the muscles of Dean’s back, and probably his freckles, Dean realized. It was not quite ticklish, and the light touch felt so good Dean almost groaned before he realized that Cas hadn’t answered him.

“Cas?”

Dean regretted it instantly, because Cas stopped whatever magic he’d been doing with his fingers and looked up at Dean. His blue eyes were huge and earnest, his voice impossibly soft when he spoke next.

“I don’t want a divorce.”


	6. A Separation

Dean froze. A cold panic settled over him. How could this have gone so horribly wrong?

“I have to go,” he muttered, and scrambled out of bed.

“Dean...” Cas said.

“I’m sorry, I gotta… I gotta go.” Dean said, trying to walk and hop into his jeans at the same time in his hurry to leave. He made it out of the bedroom and was nearly at the front door and pulling his shirt over his head when Cas called to him again.

“Dean!” He turned. Cas was standing in his bedroom doorway, completely naked, his face a mask of hurt and confusion.

Dean’s hands flew up to cover his eyes. “I’m sorry, Cas. I need to clear my head.” He turned and stumbled out the door.

 

* * *

 

The rest of the afternoon and well into the evening passed in a blur. Dean found the nearest bar and drank. When the bartender cut him off, he moved on to the next. At the third bar he went to, he caught sight of a cute brunette sitting at the other end of the counter. She licked her stir stick enticingly, and Dean was all in.

In the alley outside, she kissed him hard and ground up against him. Her breath was stale and tasted of smoke, but Dean dove in, wrapping her legs around his waist and lifting her against the wall. She giggled, and he buried his face in her neck. He was surprised to find that he was fighting back tears. She was exactly his type, and Dean wanted nothing more than to have a few minutes of hot, hard, no-strings sex to get his mind off things, but something inside him ached and everything felt wrong.

She fought with his zipper and reached unceremoniously into his pants to stroke him. He squeezed his eyes shut tight, willing his dick to cooperate. But after a few moments of inactivity, her hand stilled and she leaned back, raising her eyebrow in question.

“I’m sorry,” Dean groaned. “It’s not you…”

She huffed and wriggled out of Dean’s hold. Her eyes flashed in anger, but all Dean could think was that they weren’t the right shade of blue.

 

* * *

 

He made his way back to Cas’s place late that evening, feeling like absolute scum. What he found when he returned only made it a million times worse.

The table had been elaborately set for two, with a crisp white tablecloth and fancy napkins. Two full glasses of wine had been poured, and the rest of the bottle was nestled in a wine chiller. A candle flickered in the middle of the table, burned down almost to it’s wick. Both plates were covered with a silver dome and Dean realized with a pang that Cas must have ordered in. Dean lifted one dome carefully to peer underneath, and found a gourmet steak dinner.

“You may need to microwave it,” came a low voice from behind him.

Dean jumped and whirled around to see Cas.

“It’s been sitting awhile, so it’s probably cold by now. I’m sorry.” Cas looked dreadful. His shoulders were slumped low, his eyes sagged, and his whole face was lined with exhaustion.

Dean looked down at the table and the meal that Cas had so carefully ordered and arranged for them, then up at Cas himself, and his heart broke. Cas looked nothing like the man that Dean had woken up next to only a few days earlier. He looked like he had had all the life sucked out of him. Dean had done that to him, he realized with a pang. And that’s when he made up his mind.

He was bad for Cas. He was toxic, and he had to leave before he made things worse. Dean was not relationship material, never had been, and Cas clearly deserved so much more than this. Than him. This whole marriage thing was just ridiculous. A drunken escapade and nothing more.

Cas stared at him with wide, watery blue eyes and Dean’s resolve strengthened. He squared his shoulders and went to the spare room to pack his bag.

When he came back out, Cas handed him the annulment papers. “I finished them while you were gone today,” he said. His voice was quiet, barely more than a whisper, and sounded hollow. “If this is what you want, you just need to sign here and here, then I’ll take care of everything tomorrow.”

Dean swallowed, and scribbled his name in the places Cas had flagged.

“Thanks,” he managed, and handed the papers back to Cas. “It’s for the best, you’ll see.”

Cas looked sad and doubtful.

“I’m sorry, Cas,” he sighed. “You’re such a nice guy, I just—”

“Don’t.” Cas laughed bitterly, and tucked the papers away. He cleared his throat and spoke again a little softer. “You don’t have to leave on my account. You can stay in the spare room again, and I’ll submit these first thing tomorrow morning.”

“I don’t think that’s such a good idea, Cas.” Dean said. Frankly, he wasn’t sure he could trust himself now to be in such close proximity. Even here, now, with their annulment papers signed and an ocean of awkwardness between them, Dean itched to touch him and try to smooth away the lines that had formed on his face.

“But thanks for letting me crash here as long as you did,” he said gruffly. “It was a helluva weekend, man.” He gave a half-hearted wink, hoping to lighten the mood, and turned to leave before he made anything worse.

“Dean…”

He turned back, one hand on the doorknob. There were actual tears in Cas’s eyes now, and Dean felt his insides twist.

He paused, but neither of them said anything. And so, with every ounce of strength he had, Dean turned and walked out the door.

 

* * *

 

Dean woke early the next morning to sunlight just beginning to glint off Baby’s dash. He groaned, and stretched out his cramped limbs. His neck had a kink and his back was killing him.

As soon as the garage opened, he sorted things out with them, got the necessary parts replaced, and was able to set out on the road by lunchtime.

Usually Dean was in his glory when he got behind the wheel with nothing but road ahead of him. It always made him feel free and alive in a way he just didn’t get when he spent too long in Lawrence. Some weekends he would just leave and drive away as far as he could go before he had to turn back and make it home in time for Monday morning.

Today though, Dean didn’t feel free or alive. He felt like shit. The drive seemed to go on forever; certainly much longer going back home than it had been coming. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he was headed in the wrong direction.

Dean tried very, very hard not to think about Cas. But as the desert flashed past him, every time his mind started to wander, his thoughts circled back to sad blue eyes and soft whispers. He shook his head to clear it.

Dean arrived home in Lawrence in the early hours of the following morning. The house was dark and he let himself in quietly, not wanting to wake his father. John was passed out on the couch, the TV blaring, and empty beer cans decorating the floor around him. Dean sighed, and made to lift the half full can from his father’s outstretched hand before it fell and spilled everywhere.

Dean had a peek in the kitchen before heading upstairs. There was a mountain of dirty bowls in the sink, but not a lot else. Evidently his dad had been subsisting on cereal for the past few days. The homemade frozen meals Dean had prepared for him ahead of time were still in the freezer.

He sighed, and made his way up to bed. After spending the weekend in Cas’s bright, shiny penthouse, everything Dean looked at now seemed like shit in comparison. Their home was small and dirty and dark and dank. But, it was home, Dean thought. This is where he was meant to be.

But as he lay in bed that night, he thought maybe it felt a little less like home than it had a week ago.

 

* * *

 

Dean returned to work at Bobby’s garage the following morning. Bobby quizzed him about the weekend and Dean told him about Sam and Eileen, and how happy they seemed. And Bobby seemed happy for them. Pissed, of course, that he missed out on the wedding. But he’d never admit to that. Dean even told him briefly about Cas, in a carefully sanitized version of events. In this version of the weekend, Cas was a friend Dean met who let him crash at his place while Dean’s car was being fixed.

An hour into his shift, Bobby approached him again as Dean was making his third attempt at reconnecting an old engine.

“You didn’t meet a girl while you were in Vegas, did you?” Bobby asked, eyebrows raised skeptically.

“No,” Dean said. “Why?”

“You got the look of someone in love, is all. Moping around like a goddamn teenager and not gettin’ anything done.”

Dean spluttered, but Bobby was already walking away, leaving Dean to stare after him slack-jawed. “Get hold of yourself and get back to work!” Bobby grumbled over his shoulder.

Dean redoubled his efforts on the engine.

 

* * *

 

Life continued pretty much as it always had for the next several weeks. Dean got up, went to work at the garage, came home, fixed dinner for his Dad, and went to bed. Then got up and did it all over again.

He managed to keep sending money each week to Sam, who complained every time that he didn’t need to. It's what Dean had always done though, and he didn’t see why he should stop now. Sam had years of expensive schooling left, and now a wife to take care of as well. To stop entirely would mean that his brother had no more need for him whatsoever, and Dean just couldn’t bear the thought of that.

They texted regularly, and even skyped every week or so. Eileen often joined in and Dean grew to love her more and more each day. Sam seemed truly happy, and more relaxed with her than he had ever seen him before. Eileen would lean into Sam unconsciously, Sam’s arm would wrap around her, and he would get this dopey grin on his face whenever she wasn’t looking. It was cute as hell to watch, but it always left Dean with a peculiar sort of ache in his chest whenever he was faced with their easy intimacy with one another.

He would inevitably head to work the next morning feeling a bit sad, and then guilty about the fact that he was feeling sad. He really was happy for them.

 

* * *

 

Dean stopped short one day when the coffee shop across the street from the garage had a new item on the menu: honey lattes. Something terrible ached in Dean, and he caved. He ordered one, snapped a picture, and sent it to Cas.

_Saw this and thought of you._

No answer. Dean sat at a table, drinking the latte, and staring at his phone. This was so stupid. What had he been thinking? He was halfway done the latte before panic well and truly set in.

He was in the middle of typing out an apology text when he got a reply from Cas.

_Is it any good?_

Dean smiled, relief flooding through him. _It’s delicious,_ he typed back.

A smiley face emoji from Cas. _Is it pasteurized honey?_

 

* * *

 

Dean practically skipped back across the street to work, he was so thrilled that Cas was willing to talk to him. He’d fucked up whatever hope they’d ever had of a relationship-- not that Dean wanted one anyway, he kept reminding himself—but maybe they could remain friends through all this.

He couldn’t seem to stop smiling when he returned to work. Bobby’s eyebrow arched so high it threatened to slide right off his forehead and he mumbled something that sounded suspiciously like “love-struck idjit.”

Dean found he didn’t care.

 

* * *

 

Over the next few weeks, Dean and Cas continued to text back and forth. Dean hadn’t quite worked up the courage to call him yet, but he was working on it.

They texted about everything. The weather, their moods, work, stupid little things that they thought the other would like. Cas updated Dean with personal commentary as he watched the remaining Star Wars movies, and Dean glowed with pride.

They texted about other things too. Dean shared his frustration and despair over John’s drinking. He found it was a little easier to open up with the space of some 1300 odd miles and a phone screen between them. Cas, it seemed, felt the same way. He opened up about his loneliness and his bouts of anxiety and depression. Dean was a little surprised to hear about that. Granted, he’d been wrapped up in his own problems that weekend and so maybe he didn’t truly get to know Cas as well as he thought he did, but the breakfast incident aside, he had seemed confident during the time Dean had spent with him. Even a little cocky, with his smirks and the self-assured way that he had dismantled Dean’s whole world and reduced him to a quivering mess.

When he expressed his surprise, Cas pointed out that they hadn’t left the penthouse much while Dean was there. In his trademark blunt and matter of fact way, he said that it was Dean who made him feel confident and less afraid.

Dean wasn’t too sure what to do with that, but it made him feel a peculiar mix of warmth and sadness that he’d had any sort of effect on Cas at all.

He fell asleep each night with his phone in hand, smiling at the last text he’d received from Cas. And he would wake up each morning, checking for anything new.

Often Cas would send him dorky little jokes.

 _What do you call a wasp?_ He’d asked.

_I don’t know. What?_

_A wanna-bee :)_

Cas had thought it was hilarious, and when Dean didn’t get it, he’d sent several exceptionally long texts detailing the taxonomies of bees, wasps, and ants.

 

* * *

 

Weeks passed, and one day Cas informed him that he’d received a notice from the county clerk’s office. The annulment had been granted, and was finalized.

Dean felt something akin to regret at the news, but he brushed it aside. What came next was devastating though.

_Dean, it has been nice talking to you these past few weeks. I think it might be best that we stop though, now that everything is finalized._

Dean stared hard at his phone, too stunned to formulate a coherent reply.

 _Why?_ He managed to get out.

Cas sent a very long reply.

 _It’s too hard,_ he texted. _Talking to you, but never getting to see you or be with you. I care very deeply for you, Dean. I may have even loved you, if it’s possible to love someone you’ve only just met._

Dean’s heart fluttered uncomfortably and he kept reading.

_I can’t keep doing this knowing that it will never go anywhere and that you will never feel the same about me. I think it’s time we both moved on with our lives. I’m sorry._

Dean’s heart plummeted and he felt like he was going to be sick.

It wasn’t until that night, when the texts had stopped for good, and Dean was lying in bed alone and listening to his father snore loudly down the hall, that he realized with a sharp pang that he was maybe a little in love with the dorky idiot. And that, just maybe, he had made a terrible mistake by leaving. Dean laughed out loud at the impeccable timing of this particular moment of insight that came with all the grace of a swift kick in the nuts.

 

* * *

 

The next day at the garage Dean’s despair was apparently evident to everyone around him. Bobby frowned at him and looked like he wanted to say something, but then thought better of it.

Dean threw himself into his work. He stayed late each night that week and he fell into his old routine with ease. Work, sleep, repeat.

It all came crashing to a halt three days later when his phone rang at work, late one afternoon. The screen lit up with Cas’s name.

Dean nearly tripped over himself in his haste to answer. “Cas?!” he shouted into the phone excitedly.

But a stiff female voice answered. “Is this Dean Winchester?”

“Sure is,” Dean scowled. “Who the hell are you?”

“Mr. Winchester, I’m calling from Sunrise Hospital and Medical Centre in Las Vegas,” the woman said. “You’re listed in this phone as the emergency contact for a Castiel Novak.”

Her voice was serious and full of pity and Dean’s heart thumped erratically. Cas had joked about listing him as an emergency contact. He must have actually done it and forgot to change it back.

“Mr. Winchester?” the nurse prompted.

Dean had to clear his throat a couple of times before his voice would work. “Yeah, I’m here. Is he okay?”

“I’m afraid not.”


	7. A Close Call

Dean’s knees gave out and he slid down the wall he was leaning against to slump on the floor.

The woman’s voice began to blur and fade until he couldn’t really make it out anymore. It was okay, though. He got the important bits. “Car accident… critical condition… may not make it through the night….”

Cas was hurt, and Dean wasn’t there. His mind wandered as terrible scenes flashed before his eyes. Cas lying broken and helpless. He squeezed his eyes shut tight, but it couldn’t block out the paralyzing terror he felt.

Bobby found him there on the floor, staring blankly at nothing in particular, phone in hand.

“Dean? What’s the matter, son?” he asked, crouching down next to him.

Dean opened his mouth, but nothing came out.

“Is it Sam?” Bobby asked. “John?”

When Dean said nothing, Bobby let out a long-suffering sigh. “Is it Castiel?” he finally asked.

Dean’s head whipped around and he looked at Bobby wide-eyed. "How did you—"

“Sam told me all about him, you idjit.”

Dean nodded. “Yeah, it’s Cas. He’s hurt.”

Bobby stared at him for a long moment. “You care about him.”

It wasn’t a question, so Dean didn’t bother with answering. “I have to go,” he whispered. But he couldn’t seem to make himself move.

“Damn right you do,” said Bobby. “You go. Don’t worry about anything here. Your job is always here if you want to come back to it. And if not, well, that’s okay too,” he said emphatically. “I’ll keep an eye on your daddy. Go on.”

Bobby pulled him to his feet and gave him a gruff hug. Dean squeezed hard, hoping it would convey all his love and gratitude and everything he couldn’t put into words.

“You know,” Bobby said. “It’d be faster if you flew.”

Dean blanched.

“Hold on a tic, let me make some calls,” muttered Bobby and he disappeared into his office.

Dean was mentally calculating the time and distance to Vegas when Bobby returned.

“Got you on a flight out of Kansas City that leaves in an hour if you want it,” he said. “You better step on it though, if you want to make it in time.”

An hour to Kansas City. Three hours or so by plane to Vegas. Four, maybe five hours before he could be at the hospital later tonight. Five agonizing hours in which Cas might not make it through surgery. If he drove, he wouldn’t be there until nearly lunchtime tomorrow, by which time…

No. Dean shut down that train of thought and kicked into gear.

“Thanks Bobby, I gotta go!” he yelled over his shoulder.

And that’s how Dean found himself sitting on a plane, white knuckling the armrests and humming Metallica under his breath, eyes squeezed tightly shut.

 

* * *

 

The plane ride was terrible. It reaffirmed every worst fear Dean had about flying. The seats were small, the booze was weak, the air was stuffy, and every bump of turbulence had Dean cursing under his breath and trying to bargain for his life with a God he didn’t believe in.

 _God, if you’re even up there… if you land this plane safely, I promise I won’t swear anymore and— fuck!_ The plane jolted terribly. _Sorry, I mean from here on out. No more potty mouth, I swear. I’ll be like a changed man._

Before long, most of his bargains began to center on Cas.

 _Please don’t let him die,_ Dean pleaded. _Don’t let him die, and keep this plane from going down in a fiery crash, and I swear I’ll make it up to him. I’ll stop being fucking chickenshit, and— goddamnit, sorry. No more swearing._

As his mind swirled with terrible scenarios, a horrible new thought occurred to Dean. Cas had been hit by a car– what if it hadn’t been an accident?

New images swarmed in Dean’s mind of Cas deliberately stepping off a curb.

Cas said he struggled with depression. His family were a bunch of dicks. Hell, Dean was a dick. Maybe if he had been there, Cas wouldn’t have done this. Dean could have made it better, could have talked to Cas, could have made him smile. He could have found the goddamn balls to reciprocate Cas’s heartfelt affections.

What if all of this was Dean’s fault?

 

* * *

 

When he landed in Vegas, Dean hailed a taxi and went straight to the hospital. He made his way through endless off-white walls that smelled of disinfectant and death. A volunteer directed him to central reception, who directed him back to the emergency room. The calm, unhurried demeanor of everyone he talked to made him want to scream.

In the ER, a nurse was finally able to tell him that Cas was in surgery. Dean found this concerning, as Cas had been in surgery when the hospital called over five hours ago. Surely that wasn’t a good sign.

Someone asked him to take a seat in the waiting room.

And so, Dean sat. And fidgeted. And got up and paced. And then sat down again and sat there for over half an hour. He wanted to kick and scream and punch something and would have done anything to see the doctor right fucking now, goddamnit.

But when the doors opened and a harried looking doctor emerged, Dean took it all back, and wished the moment between not knowing and knowing could go on indefinitely, because she did not look like she was coming with good news.

Dean took a deep breath and steadied himself.

“Mr. Winchester?”

“Yes,” Dean said, panic seeping into his chest; squeezing, suffocating.

“Mr. Novak was involved in a hit and run accident. He came to us badly injured. We’re not sure how long he’d been there in the road before someone found him.”

The panic in Dean’s chest turned to white hot rage, but he shoved it all down. He felt his jaw twitch, but otherwise, presented a stoic face to the doctor.

“He suffered a head injury, blunt force trauma, massive internal bleeding, severe lacerations, and several compound fractures. We performed surgery this afternoon and thought the worst was behind us. He was stable for a short time, and then his lung collapsed, so now he’s back in the OR.”

"Is he—" Dean started.

“We just don’t know yet,” she said, curtly. “He hasn’t been conscious since he was brought in.”

Dean ran through all of Cas’s injuries in his head, cataloguing them, feeling the pain of each one as if they had happened to him. Lacerations and fractures could be fixed, he reasoned. A collapsed lung sounded scary, but Dean didn’t really know what that meant. What scared him most was the one thing he recognized: a head injury. A boy he’d played football with in high school had gone down the wrong way during a bad play and suffered a head injury. He was in a wheelchair now.

“What, um…” his brain searched desperately for words and how to string them together, but it just wasn’t working. “Paralysis?” he asked weakly at last.

“We haven’t yet determined the severity of his neck and back injuries,” she said. “Paralysis is entirely possible, but frankly, it’s a secondary concern at the moment. First, we need to get him stable and see if he wakes up. If he does…” she trailed off and her gaze narrowed on Dean, sizing him up. “You should prepare yourself for the possibility that he won’t be the same. He’s suffered a major head injury, and the effect that will have on his brain function remains to be seen.”

Dean didn’t say anything. He didn’t cry, and he didn’t collapse into a chair. He just.. stood there, staring at the woman who was shattering his whole life into tiny little pieces. He almost laughed, because yeah, Cas was his whole life. He could see it now. He could see their lives together, could see what might have been if he’d stayed. And now...

The doctor gave him a small nod. “I need to get back to surgery,” she said. “Talk to the nurse. I believe he had some personal effects with him.”

And then she left, back through the swinging doors, and Dean was left alone. He stood there for a long time staring at the doors before a nurse found him.

“Mr. Winchester?”

He looked over at a tiny woman carrying a small box.

“Mr. Novak’s personal effects. If you could just sign this release form.” She held out a clipboard and pen.

Dean skimmed the form. Cell phone, wallet, keys, no cash. He signed it and took the box from the woman.

Then he sat in a chair, and peered in the box, running his hand gently over the items that belonged to Cas. They had been on him, had been close to him moments before the accident. What had it been like, Dean wondered. Did he see the other car coming? Did he try to get out of the way? Did it hurt? How long did he lay in the street? Did he lose consciousness right away or did he lay there for hours in agony?

What had Dean been doing when it happened? Changing the oil in that old Toyota? Taking his coffee break? How could Dean’s world have been so normal today when this had been happening to Cas. Surely, he should have sensed that something was wrong; he should have known. He should have been here sooner.

He should never have left at all.

He fingered the keys to Cas’s apartment, turning them over in his hand. There was a brass keychain in the shape of a bee hanging off them and small photo of his parrot. Oh god, the bird! Cas was so devoted to that bag of feathers, he’d be devastated if anything happened to it. Dean tried to calculate how long Cas had been gone and the bird left alone, but he couldn’t be certain without knowing when the accident happened, and his thoughts kept circling back to Cas lying cold and alone on concrete.

He stood up and shook his head, wandering over to the nurse’s station.

“No word yet, hun,” she said. “He should be out soon though.”

“And then I can see him?” Dean asked.

“Oh no. When he gets out, he’ll be in the ICU. Because you’re not family, you won’t be able to see him until we’re certain he’s stable. I suggest you go home, get some sleep, and come back tomorrow rested.”

Dean frowned. There was no way in hell he was sleeping tonight. But he really should go feed the damn bird. Cas’s apartment wasn’t far. He could get there, feed Balthazar, and be back in under an hour. Then he could stay, and he wouldn’t leave until he got to see Cas, and probably not then either.

Unless Cas didn’t want him to stay this time, his brain added, unhelpfully.

Sighing, Dean hailed another cab and set out for the penthouse.

 

* * *

 

Cas’s apartment was dark and empty when Dean let himself in. He reached over instinctively to flick a light on, and heard the bird startling to rustle around in the other room.

Everything was achingly familiar. Dean had only spent a weekend here, but it felt an awful lot like coming home to a place he’d known all his life. He wandered in through the kitchen. It was gleaming and spotless as always. Dean’s eyes travelled up to the ceiling where there was still a small greasy spot they hadn’t been able to get clean from the pancake batter.

Dean was halfway through on his way to the living room when he stopped in his tracks. There was a new addition in the kitchen: a shiny new spice rack sat on the counter. Dean gave it a gentle spin and watched it whirl around. It was full of things like cumin, and thyme, and cloves. Curious now, Dean had a quick peek in the fridge. No takeout containers or pizza boxes. Dean straightened up and saw the neat stack of books on top of the fridge. He ran a finger over their spines, reading the titles of the various beginner cookbooks.

The bird squawked suddenly, breaking the silence, and Dean started. He made his way hurriedly to the living room where Balthazar was waiting impatiently. His dish was empty, and Dean dug around in the closet for the bag of food pellets he’d seen Cas give him. He opened the cage door just a crack and carefully snaked his hand inside to fill the dish. The bird snapped at him and Dean cursed, dropping pellets all over the bottom of the cage.

“ _Hello dumbass_ ,” the bird chirped, and Dean rolled his eyes.  

Dean closed the cage door carefully and watched the parrot peck aggressively at the pellets lining the cage floor. He decided he’d wait until the bird had eaten his fill before he’d risk opening the cage again to fill the water.

He looked around the living room while he waited. The Vegas skyline was a beautiful as always and Dean stared out at the lights for several long moments until the height made him dizzy and he moved back into the center of the room.

Minutes ticked by as Balthazar munched away at his food. Dean paced back and forth impatiently, willing the bird to eat faster. He should really be getting back to the hospital; Cas could be out of surgery at any time. He could wake up and Dean should be there when he did.

The crunch of the food in the bird’s beak echoed in the silent room until Dean finally cracked and made for the stereo. Even Cas’s music would be better than the stifling, suffocating silence. Dean fiddled with the knobs, expecting Gregorian chants to start playing, and was taken aback when the sound of Taylor Swift filled the room.

 _Oh Cas, no,_ Dean thought. _No, no, no._ He clicked to the next track, and the next. Bubbly, peppy pop songs filled the room and Dean groaned. This was not at all what he had in mind when he had told Cas to update his playlists. He moved the disc changer to the next CD and Zeppelin came through the speakers. Much better. He flicked ahead to the next track, which Dean recognized, and unless he was very much mistaken, this particular ordering of songs was…

Dean opened the disc player and pulled out the CD he’d made for Cas. _Son of a bitch,_ he thought. Cas’s five disc changer contained Dean’s CD, Vivaldi, Gregorian Chants for Meditation, Taylor Swift, and Beyonce.

It was an odd mix, and Dean’s mind stumbled onto a terrible possibility. What if these weren’t Cas’s CDs? What if the cookbooks and the fresh food and the signs of life in the kitchen weren’t from Cas?

_What if someone else was living with him now?_

Dean felt an icy chill run down his spine. Did some girl move in with Cas? Did some _guy_?

Dean panicked. He had just resolved to check the bedroom and washroom for signs of a second party, when he heard a key turning in the front door.

The panic he had felt a few moments earlier was nothing to what he felt now.

Pure, unadulterated terror coursed through Dean and he stood, stock still, in the middle of his ex-husband’s living room, hands full of his CDs. He might as well have been rifling through his underwear drawer. Dean considered hiding and looked around frantically.

There was a pause at the door, as the person realized the door wasn’t locked. Silence. And then the door squeaked slowly open. Slow, soft footsteps made their way carefully down the hall.

There was nothing for it. Dean stood there, bracing for the worst.


	8. Together Again

A shadowy figure emerged slowly from around the corner of the kitchen. Dean cursed himself for not turning on more lights.

His panic intensified as he realized that the figure appeared to be brandishing some sort of weapon held in the air.

“Uh.. hello?” Dean offered, hoping to diffuse the situation. He raised his hands above his head in a sign of surrender, to make himself appear less threatening.

“Dean?” came a familiar voice.

Dean’s heart skipped a beat. He recognized that voice. Before he could say anything else, Cas stepped into the light, wide eyed, hair askew, and clutching tightly to a frying pan that he held above his head.

Relief flooded through Dean, fast and fierce. He started towards Cas on instinct, wanting nothing more than to take him in his arms, hold on tight, and never let go. But he stopped short when he saw the look of fear in Cas’s eyes and his defensive posturing. Dean swayed on the spot in mid step before carefully setting his foot down and doing his best to stay where he was standing.

“You’re alive,” Dean breathed.

Cas frowned and looked down at himself as if to confirm, then back up at Dean. “An astute observation,” he said, a little warily.

And damn if Dean didn’t miss that voice. He grinned then, like an idiot, his smile stretching so wide it made his face hurt.

Cas, though, did not smile, and his frown deepened.  “Dean, why are you in my living room?” he asked, and the voice that Dean loved twisted a little darker, more menacing.

Dean’s smile withered and he turned to point at the parrot. “He was... hungry,” he spluttered.

Cas stared. He lowered the frying pan, but still held it in a death grip in front of him with both hands.

Hysterical laughter threatened to bubble up in Dean. “You uh.. you’re not gonna hit me with that, are you?” he asked, hoping to lighten the mood. It failed miserably.

Cas’s eyes narrowed to slits and he did not let go of the frying pan.

“Look, man. The hospital called.” Dean dug around his pockets and offered up the phone, wallet, and keys that the hospital had given him, his gaze darting helplessly between Cas and the items in his hand.

Cas finally lowered the frying pan slowly and deliberately to the floor. He stepped forward to take the items, staring at them in bewilderment. “How did you get these?”

Dean just stared dumbly at where Cas’s fingers had brushed his. Cas was _alive._

Cas peered at his phone and wallet in fascination. “I was mugged this morning. These were taken from me.”

Now that Cas was closer and his face was no longer in shadow, Dean could see the outline of dark bruises on his face. His lip was cut, one eye was swollen, and there was an ugly gash on his neck. Dean sucked in a breath at the sight and reached for Cas’s face without thinking. Cas flinched and leaned away before Dean could make contact, and he dropped his hand, curling it into a fist at his side.

“Who did this to you? I’ll kill them,” Dean growled.

And then the pieces started to fall into place in his head. Cas was mugged, and his phone was stolen. Then the man in the hospital must be…

“Shit,” Dean breathed. “Karma’s a nasty bitch.”

 

* * *

 

A short time later, Dean had finished explaining the situation as best he could and Cas repeatedly assured a worried Dean that he was fine despite his bruised appearance.

“It was just a mugging, Dean,” he had said. “There’s not much to tell.”

They had moved to sit on the couch, albeit rather stiffly, each occupying opposite ends with a long expanse between them. Dean itched to move closer and narrow the gap, but Cas was sitting as far away from him as it was possible to get without sitting on the armrest, so he stayed put.

Dean explained why the hospital had called, and Cas flushed a deep crimson when he realized the mix-up with the emergency contact.

“It was just a joke,” he mumbled. “I forgot, I’m sorry.”

“God, don’t be!” cried Dean. “I’m so fucking glad you did.”

Cas’s eyes flicked up to meet Dean’s briefly, before returning to stare at the floor.

“Is he okay?” Cas asked.

“Is who okay?” Dean furrowed his brow in confusion.

“The mugger.” Cas said. “Is he— will he live?”

“I dunno,” said Dean. “It sounds pretty bad. The hospital wasn’t sure of brain or spinal damage yet. But Cas, when that fucker got hit by a car, he got what he deserved,” said Dean firmly. “He _attacked_ you.”

“He got hit by a car?” Cas sounded confused.

“Yeah… wait, what did you think happened?”

“Well, I may have fought back a bit. Once he took my things and he was just standing there riffling through my wallet, I… I just lost control and something in me snapped. He managed to run away with my things, but there was… there was a lot of blood.” He looked down at his hands and Dean saw that they too were bruised and bloody.

Dean laughed. “You beat up your mugger!”

Cas glared at him sharply. “This isn’t funny, Dean.”  
  
“It’s a little funny,” he said, still chuckling. “And look, you were just defending yourself anyway.”

“Yes, that’s what I told the police,” he said bitterly. “I was just coming from there actually, and the locksmith…” he trailed off and turned to Dean, seeming to really see him for the first time.

“Wait, why are you here, Dean?”

Dean frowned. "I told you, the hospital called. They gave me your keys and I let myself in to feed the bird because I thought—" Dean choked, unable to finish his sentence.

“No, but why are you _here_ ,” Cas urged. “In Vegas.” He looked at his watch pointedly, then up at Dean. “The mugging was only this this morning.”

“Um, I flew,” Dean said.

“You flew?”

“Yeah.”

“You don’t fly,” Cas said flatly.

“And for good reason!” Dean threw his arms up emphatically. “That plane was a friggin’ death chamber hurtling through the air and I’m just expected to sit there and be calm? Not fucking likely,” he muttered.

“You flew,” Cas whispered to himself, and resumed staring at the floor.

They sat in silence.

“Hey Cas, look,” Dean started, and he slid to the other end of the couch to get closer, his patience at keeping his distance evaporating in a puff. “I’m sorry.” He stared hard at Cas, willing him to look up, to look at him.

“I’m sorry,” he continued. "I should never have left you like that. I was just—scared, I guess. But I can’t stop thinking about you, Cas. You drive me crazy. You’re this weird, dorky, guy, and it doesn’t make any sense. But I—" Dean faltered, as Cas finally looked up at him, his blue eyes piercing and unreadable.

“If this is supposed to be an apology, it’s terrible,” said Cas bluntly. 

Dean let out a breathy laugh. “Yeah, well, I meant it when I said I sucked at relationships. I’m a colossal fuckup, Cas. I don’t know how to do this. Any of this.” He shrugged helplessly. “But I know that my life got a little brighter that weekend in Vegas when I woke up next to you. And when I left, it got… darker again. I thought I was doing the right thing, but now I’m not so sure.”

Cas squinted at him, his expression unreadable.

“I miss you. And I know it’s selfish of me, but I need you, Cas,” Dean said. “Divorcing you was the single stupidest thing I’ve ever done. And I’ve done some remarkably stupid things in my time.”

“That sounds accurate,” Cas said, and Dean detected a hint of softness in his voice now.

Dean took a deep breath, bracing for what he was about to do next. He had thought about it the whole way here on the plane, the only thing keeping him from losing his mind entirely. It was a little crazy, but everything about his time with Cas had been crazy, he reasoned, and he felt deep in his gut like this was the right thing to do. The only thing to do.

He slid off the couch to kneel on the ground in front of Cas. He dug around in his pocket, swearing a little under his breath when he couldn’t find it, but grinned triumphantly when he finally pulled his hand out, holding up his mother’s ring.

“Will you marry me, Cas? Again?”

A beat passed. A moment of silence in which Cas just stared at him and Dean felt the seconds tick by like an eternity.

And then Cas laughed and shook his head. “I won’t marry you, Dean.”

His heart dropped to the floor and shattered into tiny pieces. He took it back. This right here was the single stupidest thing he’d ever done in his miserable life. Of course Cas wouldn’t want to marry him. Why would he? His face felt hot and something was stinging at his eyes. What the hell had he been thinking? What could possibly have possessed him to think any of this was a good idea?

And then Cas took Dean’s face in his hands, firm but gentle. “I won’t marry you, Dean. But I’d very much like to date you.” He gave a tentative, quirk of a smile. “If you’ll have me, that is.”

And then there was air in Dean’s lungs again. He let out a gasp of relief, and then there were definite tears streaming down his face.

Cas laughed, and wiped them away with his thumbs. “We skipped over so much last time. Got it all assbutt backwards. Not that there’s a right way to do these things, but I know I came on too strong. I always do that, I can’t seem to help it. I know I probably scared you, and I don’t want—“

“Stop it, you did nothing wrong. Please don’t ever change.” Dean said firmly. “I’m clearly the idiot here, not you.”

“Well I won’t argue that, but I’m pretty sure we’re both idiots, Dean. And if it’s all the same, I’d like to do it proper this time. I’d like all the things we didn’t get to have before. A first date… holding your hand… goodnight kisses.” Cas looked at him with no small amount of apprehension. He needn’t have worried though.

“I’d like that too, Cas.”

Dean leaned into him, confident this time. As their lips met and their arms found their way around one another, Dean relaxed into it, completely unafraid for once in his life.


	9. Epilogue

“Cas wait,” Dean urged, and pulled his boyfriend back a moment.

“Dean, we’re going to be late!” Cas huffed.

“Well they can’t exactly start without us now, can they?” He pressed Cas up against the wall and leaned in to kiss him. He began to snake his hands up into that beautiful, dark head of hair when Cas grabbed both his hands firmly and stopped him with a serious look.

“Don’t mess up my hair. It took me forever to get it to lay flat.”

Dean chuckled, and when Cas released his hands, he let them travel downward instead. He trailed deliberately over a nipple and sealed their lips in another kiss, swallowing down the soft moan that Cas emitted.  He moved his hands lower still, reaching around to cup his boyfriend’s ass, and slotting their hips together. He had gotten Cas’s buckle halfway undone and was attempting to reach down the front of his pants when Cas finally snapped. Strong arms spun him around, and Dean found himself pressed up against the wall, pinned and immobile.

“And do _not_ mess up this suit,” Cas growled, one eyebrow arched high. But there was no malice in his voice, and the twinkle in his eyes gave him away.

Dean grinned. It had been almost two years, and sometimes he still couldn’t believe that he was allowed to have this. He leaned forwards to rest his forehead against Cas’s, letting out a soft sigh.

“I love you,” he whispered into the space between them.

“Oh, Dean,” Cas murmured. He brushed his lips softly against Dean’s, then pulled back. Warm blue eyes studied Dean for a long moment, searching his face. Then he kissed him again, squarely on the nose. “Are you ready for this?”

“Hell yes!” Dean grabbed his boyfriend’s hand, interlaced their fingers, and squeezed. Hand in hand, they walked into the small chapel where they had first met.

 

* * *

 

Inside, their family was waiting. Sam, Eileen, Bobby, and John greeted them warmly. There were hugs and handshakes all around.

Notably absent was any of Cas’s family, which wasn’t a surprise; Cas hadn’t invited any of them. Not that Dean could blame him. But still, he thought he saw a flash of sadness in those blue eyes when he first looked around. It vanished quickly when Sam pulled him into a giant bear hug and called Cas his brother. “Welcome to the family,” he said, and Cas’s eyes were full of nothing but warmth and love.

They settled at a table to wait and Dean’s heart swelled as he took everything in. All of the people he loved most were here together in one room. Even his dad showed up. He knew Bobby had something to do with that, but he was grateful all the same.

At first, John hadn’t taken too kindly to the news that his oldest son was bisexual; but as time passed, he had started to come around. The last time Dean and Cas came to visit in Lawrence, a man in a diner passed their table where they were holding hands and sneered at them in disgust. John punched the guy out cold. It was a considerable setback for John’s anger management therapy, but Dean appreciated the gesture all the same.

The real turning point had been when John checked into a rehab clinic. He’d relapsed once since, but seemed to be doing well now. Although Dean had moved to Vegas a long time ago, Bobby had kept a careful eye on his father, and Dean checked in regularly.

As Dean looked over at his Dad, he realized how haggard he appeared. He was quiet, and a bit sullen, slouching in his chair and nursing a glass of water. But he was still here, and that meant everything to Dean.

“Hey Dad,” said Dean. “Thanks for coming.”

“Hmmph,” John muttered. But then he met Dean’s eye and straightened up a bit, clearing his throat. “Congratulations, son.”

Dean beamed.

Next to him, Cas and Bobby were talking animatedly about Shakespeare, and Dean smiled. While Cas was always pleasant enough with John, their relationship was tenuous at best, and often mired by skepticism on both their parts. But Cas had taken to Bobby like an old friend.

And well, old friends bicker.

“Shakespeare was clearly gay,” Cas said. “He writes to a lovely male youth in the sonnets: But thy eternal summer shall not fade,” he recited. “That’s completely gay! You can’t possibly deny that.”

“I ain’t denying anything,” said Bobby. “All I’m sayin’ is he was more straight than gay. Half those sonnets were written to a dark lady, and those were a helluva lot more intimate.”

John cleared his throat from the other side of the table. “Maybe he was bisexual,” he grumbled. Both Bobby and Cas turned to stare at him, mouths agape.

Dean smiled, and settled back in his chair, facing Sam and Eileen. Sam’s leg was shaking and he was practically vibrating out of his chair.

“What’s gotten into you?” Dean asked.

“Fine, I can’t wait anymore,” said Sam excitedly, and shoved an envelope at him. “Open it!”

Dean looked down at the envelope, which was addressed to both him and Cas. He looked up questioningly.

“It’s your wedding present,” explained Eileen, smiling.

Dean poked Cas in the ribs. He turned from his conversation with Bobby and leaned in close to wrap an arm around Dean’s waist. “Wedding present,” Dean muttered.

Cas looked on as Dean opened the envelope and pulled out a cheque. Both their eyes bulged at the amount and Dean looked up sharply.

“Sammy, this is—”

“It’s all the money you’ve sent me,” Sam interrupted. “Well, not all of it. But I saved most of it, always intending to give it back to you someday when you’d actually take it.”

“There’s more,” said Eileen, nodding at the envelope.

Dean opened the envelope further and a photo fell out. Cas’s chin came to rest on Dean’s shoulder and they both peered at it, then back up at Sam and Eileen.

“It’s… a house,” said Dean slowly. A rundown, slightly dilapidated looking, old farmhouse to be more precise.

“It’s ten minutes from us, and it’s up for sale,” Sam said, practically bouncing up and down. “The cheque should cover most of it, or at least a sizable down payment. I talked to the seller, and he’s agreed to hold offers for a few days to give you a chance to come see it, if you’re interested.” His words started to spill out quickly in his excitement and Eileen placed a hand on his arm to slow him down. He took a deep breath and continued. “It needs quite a bit of work, but you’re handy, and it’s on a big lot. There’s even beehives out back.”

Cas perked up at that and Sam grinned. “Thought you’d like that Cas. I know you always wanted your own but couldn’t because you lived in the city. And you can work from anywhere, right?”

Cas nodded slowly.

Dean frowned. “I don’t understand… why are you so excited about this place? Why now?”

Sam’s voice turned serious. “You were always there for me growing up, and my childhood wouldn’t have been what it was without you, Dean. I can’t imagine not having you there, and well…” he looked over at Eileen and put his arm around her shoulder. “I want you there for my kid, too.”

“We would hate for our baby girl to grow up without her uncles around,” Eileen said, one hand on her belly.

“Well I’ll be damned,” muttered Bobby.

Dean stared slack-jawed, his gaze darting between his brother and Eileen. “I’m going to be an uncle?!”

Eileen nodded happily, and Dean sat back in his seat with a low whistle. “Way to steal my thunder today, you guys,” he joked.

“Consider it payback for the stunt you pulled at our wedding,” Sam smirked.

“Dean Winchester and Castiel Novak?” came a call from the chapel. Dean looked up and turned in his seat, nearly falling out of it in nervous excitement. “We’re ready for you!”

He whirled back around to face his brother. “Do you have it ready to go, Sammy?”

Sam rolled his eyes, but smiled, and held up his camcorder, ready to hit play. Dean let out a sigh of relief and reached out to squeeze Cas’s hand again.

As it turned out, Dean Winchester was the marrying type after all. And with this wedding, he was determined to never forget a single moment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading and sticking it out to the end! (I can't believe you made it this far.)
> 
> If you're so inclined, I'd appreciate any feedback of the good or bad variety. Constructive criticism is completely welcome! This is my first time writing anything longer than a coda, so I'd like to be able to take your suggestions and improve for next time.


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